Eligible
by elanev91
Summary: Lily Evans, television producer with uTV, is moving into her second series with Eligible, the UK's newest dating show. After a strong (and morally questionable) first series on her part, she's been given the chance to work with this year's bachelor, James Potter. Unfortunately for James and Lily, these things hardly ever go as planned.
1. Prologue

**I told a poor anon I'd write this a literal year ago and here we are (finally). And also please come say hi to me, anon, because I want to thank you for getting me to write this stupid thing that I love too much for words.**

 **At the risk of looking like I'm giving my Oscars acceptance speech, I do want to take a minute to thank all of my lovely, lovely friends for getting me through this fucking fic. Thank you for listening to me bitch about it, thank you for telling me that I needed to stop being mean to myself in my comments (even though things like "this is shit – fix in edits" really are _part of my process_ ), thank you for giving me weird little details about things that I pulled from your lives and incorporated into this fic, thank you for reading it over and over again as it developed and for leaving me every keyboard smash, scream, and note for improvement.**

 **scaredofrobots levins18 beks21 petalstofish professor-riddikulus – this fic would not be what it is without you and I love you all so immensely that my repressed little heart can't even begin to tell you.**

 **To my poor tumblr friends I spent the entire month of May torturing ( julxr4 youreyesinstarsabove victoria8719 raissassampaio women-inthe-sequel jamespottrr decaffeinatedmouse carolynn1735 itssoweirdyoureher tevescomoungirasol and whoever the fuck else I didn't mention because I am lucky enough to have so many of you but not lucky enough to have a good memory) – there is a universe where I'm sorry (also I love you).**

 **And, finally, for those of you that don't already know, enjoy the twist.**

* * *

'Tell James he has twenty minutes.'

Lily heard Mary knock on James' door over her earpiece before she let go of the call button and the line fell silent again. Marlene raised her eyebrow at Lily, but Lily distinctly avoided her gaze, sifted through the papers on her clipboard instead, double checked the filming schedule for the day to make sure they didn't already miss some fucking call time that she'd forgotten about.

She knew they hadn't, but she'd do anything to avoid looking at Marlene right now.

'Ms Evans,' Lily's attention snapped back to Mary — she _never_ called her that unless there was really bad news. 'He says that he doesn't want to go through with this.'

Lily must have blanched, because Marlene was now looking at her with intense interest. Lily grabbed the end of her mouthpiece and pressed it closer to her mouth, lowered her voice as she walked swiftly out of the makeup room. 'Well he should have fucking thought about that, there is nothing that I can do for him now! Tell him he signed a contract!'

Mary sighed and Lily heard her knock again before she cut the connection. Lily's anxiety peaked as she listened to the silence ringing in her ears and she did her best to walk quickly through the corridors without breaking into a full run.

Mary clicked back onto the radio. 'He said he doesn't care about the contract. He was packing his bags when he opened the door.'

'I don't give a flying _fuck_ if he cares about the contract, and he better _not_ be packing his bags,' Lily hissed, and she doubled her pace through the hotel. 'Mary, keep him distracted, I'm going to be there in a minute.'

'Lily, I — '

'Mary, just fucking do it. I'm not losing this fucking finale episode because Potter's getting jitters. Talk to him — I'll be there in a minute.'

Mary was silent for a moment before she exhaled heavily. 'Yeah, alright. I'll do what I can.'

'That's all I ask.'

Lily was half-tempted to switch off her walkie, run into the nearest broom cupboard and scream out some of her stress, but she really, _really_ didn't have time for that, especially if James was already packing his bags.

When she got to James' hotel room a moment later, she noticed that Mary had slid the catch so that she didn't have to wait to be let in (probably because if she knocked, there was no way that James was going to let her in). She rapped hard on the door as she pushed it open, and Mary and James, standing in the middle of the room, whipped around to look at her as she walked through the door. Mary's expression, stressed and apologetic, was the complete opposite of James' angry, defiant one.

'James, what's going on?' Lily asked, doing her best to slide into her "Nice Producer" voice even while she wanted to fucking throttle him. 'Liza and Summer are in hair and makeup already, I'm going to need you to — '

'No.' James crossed his arms, shook his head. 'I told Mary I'm not doing it. I can't do that to them, they think — '

'James,' Lily said, gritting her teeth to keep it together, 'you signed a contract. The network will have you for everything you fucking have and then some if you back out now.'

'Surely you can make up some hyper dramatic ending that will make the network forget all about wanting to sue me,' James said, laughing derisively, 'that's your job, isn't it?'

That fucking stung and he knew it. Lily exhaled sharply. 'My _job,_ Mr Potter, is to get you in a fucking tuxedo and up to that fucking observation deck so that you can propose to one of these fucking women. _That_ is my job and whether you like it or not, that's what you agreed to do, so you're going to stop whatever this,' she gestured vaguely in the air around him, 'is, and get it the fuck together. Mary — ' she turned quickly and caught Mary's eye, 'head to hair and makeup, make sure that Marlene is ready and then escort her up to the observation deck. Be back here to get James in fifteen to take him to set.'

It was a testament to Mary's faith in her that she didn't hesitate before she turned on her heel and walked out of the hotel room.


	2. Chapter 1

**I'm feeling generous.**

 **See you next week ;)**

* * *

It wasn't Lily's first series with _Eligible,_ but she'd somehow forgotten what a complete and total shit show it was right from the very beginning.

They'd just, literally _just_ , cast their bachelor for this series, some famous footballer that played for Chelsea before he fucked up his knee last season, but her inbox was already flooded with emails and her phone was practically ringing off the hook with a million little fires that she had to put out (because apparently she was the only competent one on the production staff) and she was already at the point where she wanted to rip her hair out and she couldn't honestly remember why she decided that coming back for another series was going to be a good idea.

Well, it was her bank account that had done the deciding, but still.

She had locked herself in her office a few minutes ago, determined to take at least a little bit of time to get through her inbox, when there was a knock on her door. She closed her eyes, took a deep breath to suppress a groan, and crossed her fingers that this wasn't going to be something else that she needed to add to her list of fucking things to do today.

'Come in.'

Her office door opened and Marlene, their host (and her incredibly annoying best friend), was smiling at her from the doorframe.

At the sight of Marlene, Lily knew that she didn't need to pretend to be nice. 'I've got another production meeting in an hour and I've got a literal fuck ton of emails to get through, so can you make it quick?'

Marlene walked into Lily's office, shut the door behind her, and sat down in the chair opposite her desk. When Lily glanced at her, she was grinning.

'Have you seen him yet?'

Lily sighed, finished typing out her email before she turned to face Marlene more fully. 'Of course I've seen him,' she said, raising an eyebrow. 'I'm the producer in charge of his every fucking need.'

Marlene wiggled her eyebrows. 'Good on you, Evans. How did you score that? You didn't kill all the other producers, did you?'

Lily grabbed a pen out of her cup and whipped it at Marlene's head. 'Sod off. According to Peter, it's an "honour that I earned after my impressive work on our inaugural series".'

She rolled her eyes and Marlene snorted. 'Peter's a twat.'

Lily tipped her head in agreement. 'That he is, but here we are.'

Her inbox pinged again and she groaned, turned back to her laptop to open the email.

'You excited to get to work with him at least?' Marlene asked, grinning at Lily again.

Lily rolled her eyes. 'I guess? It's just a job, Mar, I'm sure it won't be some non-stop fun fest.'

'Hey, he's fit. Like, _really_ fit. I'm sure it will be at least an occasional fun fest.'

Lily snorted. 'Whatever. What if he's a prat? Isn't he some big footballer?'

Marlene nodded. 'He played for one of the biggest clubs in the country. Even _you_ should know who he is.'

Lily just shrugged and kept flicking through her emails.

'When are you going to meet with him? You have to talk to him before you can start casting the contestants, right?'

Lily nodded, replied without looking away from her screen. 'Mary said he's coming in this afternoon. We're going out to lunch and then we're going to come back here and start sifting through the binders.'

She saw Marlene's jaw drop out of the corner of her eye. ' _Binders?_ Plural?'

'Yup,' Lily lifted one hand and pointed to a table in the corner of her office. 'The last series went over really well. A lot of women are interested, apparently.'

Marlene shook her head in amazement. 'Do you two have to go through every woman in there?'

'Oh, no,' Lily said, hitting send on her email and turning to roll her eyes at Marlene. 'Peter had all the PAs classify the women and arrange them so that when I get...' she looked down at the notepad on her desk that still had their bachelor's name scribbled on it, '... James' preferences, we can just look in those sections to save time.'

Marlene made a disgusted face. 'That is so foul.'

'Oh, I know,' Lily said. 'I question my decision to be here every day, trust me.'

'Why _did_ you stay,' Marlene asked, leaning back in her chair and kicking her feet up onto the edge of Lily's desk. 'You hated working with the contestants last year.'

She'd gone into the first series without any idea of what to expect — the show was brand new, she'd never worked in reality TV, and all she'd had to go on was the pitch. It hadn't seemed like the most interesting work, just following around a half dozen women, making sure there was some drama for the cameras, but it had turned out to be far worse than she'd imagined.

When Peter made her follow Jessie B with a camera until she cried, she'd almost told Peter to go fuck himself and quit.

Almost.

Lily sighed. 'I know, but it's not like there were a lot of other offers on the table and the money… you know I need the money.'

Marlene nodded. 'Yeah, I get that. They just made you guys do some pretty horrific shit last year, so I'm surprised you're sticking around.'

Lily sighed. 'I know. But my rent doesn't pay itself and there weren't any other projects that I could get on before this started up again.'

Marlene was about to reply when Lily's mobile started to ring and Lily swore angrily. 'Fucking hell, am I ever going to get a moment of peace again?'

Marlene laughed, slid her legs off of Lily's desk and pushed herself to her feet. 'Not for the next six months or so.'

Lily held her fingers up at Marlene as she answered the phone, and Marlene chuckled under her breath as she left the office.

* * *

A few hours later, Lily was still replying to emails as she climbed out of the studio's car to meet… _fuck…_ she clicked back to her notes to double check his name ( _James Potter. James Potter, James Potter, James Potter_ ) for lunch.

Her PA, Mary, had made them a reservation at some fancy French place (literally one of the only perks of Lily's job). James wasn't there when she arrived, so she ordered a bottle of wine for the table and replied to emails while she waited. She'd been there for a few minutes when the waiter appeared by her table with — _holy. Fucking. Fuck._

James Potter looked great in his headshots, but those headshots had _nothing_ on James Potter in real life.

He was taller than she'd expected, and broader — the way his shirt stretched across his chest made it clear that, football injury or not, he _definitely_ still worked out. His jawline was sharp, just a bit square, but his truly chaotic black hair softened him a bit, gave him a boyish charm that was surprisingly appealing. Even his _glasses_ — she didn't normally go for a bloke in glasses, but these fit him somehow. The tortoiseshell gave him a more sophisticated look, the rich mottled brown of the frames complemented his warm, tan skin, and the lenses made his eyes look like they were shining just that much brighter.

She hopped to her feet, extended her hand. 'Mr Potter. It's lovely to meet you, I'm Lily Evans.'

James reached out, took her hand, smiled broadly at her. 'It's wonderful to meet you, Lily. And please, just James.'

She was _supposed_ to be leading him into a conversation about the programme, letting him know the basic agenda for their lunch meeting, but, instead, she pointed to his glasses as they sat down and said, 'Are those, like, an aesthetic thing?'

She could have fucking kicked herself.

James laughed, thankfully, and shook his head. 'No, why?'

Now too deep into it to change the subject, she decided to just lean into it. 'You aren't wearing glasses in any of the pictures we have of you. I was just curious.'

James took a sip of his wine before he replied. 'I just recently started wearing them again. I really hate wearing contacts, but I did what I had to do to make sure my club didn't suddenly decide to pass on me.'

'What?' Lily said, setting her wine down, 'They can do that?'

James nodded. 'Do you remember the Boyd trade debacle in 2013?'

'I'm not up on my Premier League trade history, if I'm honest.'

James smiled sheepishly and ran a hand through his hair. 'Right, sorry. Well, that was the year that I signed with Chelsea, so when that deal fell through early in the transfer period, I was fucking terrified. Basically, from what we all heard anyway, it was a done deal until his eye test came back with "inconclusive results".'

'Didn't people _know_ that you wore contacts though?' Lily said. 'I mean, you'd been playing for, what? A million years?'

James raised an amused eyebrow at her and she shrugged. 'I don't know how football works.'

James laughed. 'I've been playing seriously since I was fifteen, but yeah, I've been playing for basically a million years.' He shot her a wry smile.

'I was lucky enough to have someone tell me early on that I needed to just wear contacts and be silent about it if I ever wanted to go anywhere. So that's what I did.' James grabbed his wine off the table, took a long drink before he smiled at her. 'Now that my bloody career is over, though, I can go back to wearing glasses. Tiny victories.'

He was smiling, but she could tell from the look in his eyes that he wasn't at all happy about it.

'Right,' she said, clearing her throat. 'Sorry to bring all that back up for you.'

James waved her off. 'No, don't worry about it, it's alright. It's been a few months, so I've come to terms with it. It helps that every conversation I've had since that match tends to linger on it. You get over things a lot faster when you have to talk about them constantly.'

'Fuck — shit — ugh, I'm sorry, I — '

James laughed heartily. 'Not supposed to be swearing at your new on-air talent?'

Lily sighed, finished off her glass of wine. 'No. No, I'm not.'

'Well don't worry, Evans,' James said, leaning across the table and smiling conspiratorially at her. 'I swear I won't breathe a word of it.'

His eyes were warm, rich hazel with flecks of gold and they crinkled just a bit at the corners when he smiled.

He was absolutely gorgeous.

'So,' she said, clearing her throat, pulling her eyes from his, and opening the menu in front of her and beginning to scan. 'I'm not sure what you know about the programme or what we're going to be talking about today, so — '

'Oh, I don't know anything,' James said, laughing, and Lily caught his eye again when she looked up, shocked. James grinned at her surprised expression. 'My brother was the one that replied to uh, what's his name — '

'Peter,' Lily said, 'Peter Pettigrew, the executive producer.'

'Yeah,' James said, waving his hand airily, 'him. Anyway, my brother replied to that recruiting email he sent out. He thought that I needed something to "stop me being so bloody pathetic and whinging about my knee".'

'But,' Lily gaped at him, 'you signed a contract. _You_ signed the contract, right?'

'Oh yeah,' James said, nodding, 'of course. My solicitor and I went through it before I signed anything, don't you worry.'

'So,' she shut her menu, raised an eyebrow at him, 'you _do_ know the premise of the show, what we're expecting from you and all that?'

'Oh yeah,' James said, grinning at her, 'I got all those details down.'

'Then why did you say you didn't know anything?!'

'Oh, I just meant that I didn't know anything about what we were supposed to be doing _today._ '

You have got to be fucking kidding.

James laughed. 'You look like you want to murder me.'

'I wonder why that is.'

It slipped out before she could stop it, but now she was too irritated with him to care. James, though, didn't seem to mind — he just sent her a wide smile, opened his menu again.

'So,' he said, 'why don't you tell me what the plan is for today.'

Lily took a breath and started to run through her spiel. 'Alright, so today, we're basically going to get to know one another and go over some of the details of your appearance on the show. We're going to be spending a lot of time together over the next few months, so we need to make sure we can work well together.'

'Isn't this your job though?' James asked.

She stopped abruptly, confused, quirked an eyebrow. 'What?'

'Being my producer,' he clarified, 'Like I can't just get another one if we don't get on.'

Lily laughed a bit derisively. 'You're the star of the show, you can do whatever you want.'

'Oh,' James said. There was a look on his face she couldn't quite decipher, but paired with the way his hazel eyes were slowly moving over her features, it was almost too much to bear. He licked his bottom lip.

'I doubt we have any trouble getting on,' he said.

Her pulse skittered.

Lily grinned, and she hoped it looked professional because at the moment, her thoughts were distinctly _un_ professional. 'I don't expect we will either.'

He held her gaze for a long moment before he cleared his throat, dropped his eyes to the menu in front of him. 'So, what show details do we need to talk about?'

Lily pulled in another (slightly shaky) breath. 'We're going to talk about what kind of women you usually go for, what you're looking for in terms of romantic matches, that kind of thing. We have some binders back at the office that we're going to go through after lunch that my assistant, Mary, should have mentioned?'

She glanced up at James to confirm and he nodded, took a drink of his wine. 'I've heard about the binders, yes.'

She nodded, glanced back at her menu again before she closed it, folded her hands neatly over top it. 'Once we narrow down the field to fifty or so women, we'll invite them in for interviews, do their background checks, evaluations, that sort of thing. No one gets through without approval from the executive producers, so you're going to be in good hands.

'Other than that,' Lily continued, 'I just want to get a sense of what you're expecting in terms of your experience on the show. I'm _your_ producer — I'm going to be working closely with you throughout filming, addressing your concerns, communicating with other staff on your behalf…. Last year, we let our bachelor choose some of the dates that we sent him on, and it worked really well, so we're going to talk about that today as well. That is an ongoing conversation, of course, but anything you know off the bat that you're interested in would be great, so that we can start planning some of that stuff in advance.'

'Wow, we've got a lot to cover, Evans,' James said, smirking at her.

She nodded, saw the waiter approaching out of the corner of her eye. 'That we do, Potter. So we better get started.'


	3. Chapter 2

**welcome back, friends x**

* * *

They spent lunch on largely personal topics, mainly because Lily was too nervous to be overheard talking about the show and risk anything getting leaked before the network was ready.

'The press doesn't even know I'm doing this yet,' James said, laughing. 'How could anything we talk about turn into a leak?'

Lily shrugged. 'I don't know, I'm just not trying to take any risks.'

James laughed. 'Well, that doesn't seem like very much fun.'

'Sorry, but I'd rather take risks when my paycheck isn't on the line.'

James hummed, tipped his head in acknowledgement. 'Alright, fair.'

Lily pointedly ate a bite of her risotto and James snorted. 'So,' she said, biting back a smile, 'tell me about you.'

James arched an eyebrow, leaned back in his chair a bit. 'What do you want to know?'

She said, 'Everything,' before she could stop herself and James grinned.

'Everything? Well, this would need to be a mutual thing, then.'

'Oh?'

'Yeah, I can't be admitting all my secrets to you and getting nothing back.'

'What do you need my secrets for?'

'I thought we were supposed to make sure we could get on. What if you're secretly a UKIP supporter or something? That's a no-go for me.'

Lily shot him a look. 'Do I look like an idiot to you?'

James laughed. 'Alright, perfect. See, that wasn't so hard.'

Lily rolled her eyes. 'Fine, whatever. This can be mutual as long as you promise to stop irritating me.'

James grinned. 'Well, I think we both know that I can't promise that.' He waited for Lily to say something snappy in response, but she decided not to give in. She just sat there, ate her risotto quietly, and watched him. After a few moments, he frowned. 'What, nothing to say?'

'No,' she said, taking a sip of her wine, 'I've got plenty I could say. I've just realised that banter is your way of deflecting, and I'd like to actually have a productive conversation at some point today.'

James laughed. 'You think that's what I'm doing?'

Lily still didn't bite. 'Yes.'

James sat there quietly for a few moments, ate a few bites of his soup to pass the time. Lily just waited him out, watched him get progressively more restless as the silence stretched on. After a few minutes of silence, he broke. 'Alright, fine. Give me a question.'

Lily grinned. 'So, your brother replied to our recruiting letter?' James nodded and Lily continued, 'But why did _you_ decide to go through with it?'

James took another bite of soup to buy himself a moment, then leaned back in his chair, and considered her. 'You're not going to let me banter my way out of this are you?'

Lily shook her head. 'Nope.'

James sighed. 'Alright — this stays between us, right? It's completely off the record?'

'I'm not a journalist.'

'No, I know, I just — I just need to make sure that — '

Lily raised her hand like she was making a pledge. 'You have my word.'

James nodded, cleared his throat, dropped his eyes for just a moment before he looked at her again.

'Part of it is what Sirius said, my brother,' he clarified, seeing the confused look on her face. 'I _do_ need to get out of the house and do something now that I can't play football anymore, and this was a pretty well-timed distraction because it starts the same time as the season that I'm now not playing in. But — '

He fell silent, bit the corner of his lip, studied her for a moment before he continued. 'But part of me is also just kind of a sucker for this romantic stuff, and I don't know. Maybe I'll meet my _soulmate_ or something.' He said it like he didn't believe it, but there was something about the softness of his expression that told her he did. At least a little bit.

It took a truly Herculean effort to bite back her laugh. The smile tugging at the corners of her lips must have betrayed her, though, because James ran an awkward hand through his hair. 'Yeah, I know, it's hilarious.'

'No,' she said, shaking her head while still fighting her smile. 'I mean, alright, I just — I just don't think _this_ is the kind of show where you go for that.'

James raised an eyebrow. 'This is _your_ show.'

'It's not _my_ show. I just — I don't know, I'm a huge cynic, so I'm not exactly the person to ask about this kind of thing.'

'Oh?'

Lily picked up her wine glass and swirled it around slowly in her hand. 'I just haven't always had the best luck and now I'm old and bitter.' She took a long drink before she set her glass down.

'You're not old and bitter,' James said. 'And a few shitty relationships doesn't mean you have to lose faith in the whole concept.'

She cocked an eyebrow. 'Have you ever met anyone worth sticking around for?'

James just looked steadily back at her. 'Maybe.'

She waved a hand. 'Well, anyway. Alright, so I guess you're actually here for love, then.'

'Why does that surprise you?'

'I don't know,' she said, 'You're just…' she gestured vaguely with her hand, 'you know.'

'No, Evans,' James said, smiling now, 'I don't know. Care to elaborate?'

She groaned. 'Oh, shut up. Next question — '

James laughed. 'Hey, you didn't answer my question!'

'Too bad,' Lily said, drinking the last of her wine before refilling her glass. 'You don't need the ego boost, and I'm not going to give it to you anyway.'

James grinned at her, held his glass out so that she could top his off as well.

She leaned back in her seat, took a long drink of wine, and smiled at him. 'Tell me about yourself.'

James mimicked her, his eyes shining with amusement. 'What do you want to know?'

She rolled her eyes. 'Just give me an overview.'

James grinned, took another sip of his wine before he set his glass down, and launched into what seemed to be a fairly rehearsed narrative. 'James Potter, 30, son of Euphemia and Fleamont Potter, former professional footballer, now a professional layabout,' he shot Lily a grin, 'brother, Sirius Black, engaged to my best friend Remus Lupin. Now that they're in love, they're lowkey obsessed with _everyone_ being in love, hence —'

He gestured over at her and she laughed. 'Okay, go on.'

'Let's see…' James looked around for a moment before his eyes met hers again and he smiled. 'I won a draughts tournament at my school when I was ten, I once rescued a puppy without asking Mum and Dad, I managed to break our school's detention record in Year Ten, and I'm hopelessly addicted to carbohydrates in all their forms.'

'You — '

James held up his hand, 'Nope. I'm not elaborating until you do yours.'

Lily sighed, but she knew that he wasn't going to give in. 'Lily Evans, also 30, youngest of two daughters to Michael and Diane Evans, got my degree in Film and Television from Edinburgh, been living in London since I graduated.'

'Okay,' James said, 'what else?'

Lily took another bite of risotto, hummed. 'Uh… when I was six, I broke my femur after my friend dared me that I wouldn't jump off the high point of the swing, I was kind of a goody two shoes until I punched a boy in the face in Year Seven, and, uh, I, too, am hopelessly addicted to carbs.'

James grinned at her, drained the last of his wine, stuck his hand out across the table for her to shake. 'I think we're going to get along splendidly, Evans.'

* * *

After lunch, a car came to pick them up and bring them back to the studio so that they could actually do something productive (instead of chatting like they'd _been_ doing for the past hour and a half). As soon as the doors shut on them in the car, Lily turned to him. 'Alright, now we can speak a bit more freely about the show, so if you don't mind — '

James grinned. ' _Or_ we could just keep talking about ourselves.'

Lily rolled her eyes. 'I would like to do my job at some point today, Potter.'

James sighed, but agreed.

'Great,' she slipped back into her more professional tone, and though James raised an amused eyebrow at her, she ignored him. 'So when we get back to the studio, we're going to start going through the binders. After that, we'll chat a bit more about the process and I'll answer any questions you might have at this stage. Sound good?'

James nodded, 'Yeah, yeah, sounds perfect.'

'So, uh, let's get some details out of the way first, yeah? For the binders.' James nodded and she cleared her throat, tried to make it sound like she was more confident than she was now feeling. 'What kinds of women are you usually attracted to?'

James flushed high on his cheeks. 'Uh, I mean, like — '

'Do you have a type?' Lily clarified, her voice getting a bit stronger. 'A look or whatever that you find particularly attractive?'

James ran his hand through his hand through his hair. 'I, uh, I guess? I don't know.'

Lily raised an eyebrow and James' blush intensified. 'I — '

'James, this is nothing to be embarrassed about. We just have _hundreds_ of women in those binders back in my office, and I'd rather not spend a ton of time looking at blondes or whatever if you don't particularly fancy them.'

James frowned. 'It seems gross when you put it like that.'

Lily nodded. 'That's because it is. But it's my job to spend the afternoon basically shopping for women with you, so there we are.'

James was quiet for a few moments, his gaze moving from Lily down to his hands folded neatly in his lap.

'Having second thoughts?'

James jumped a little, and she smiled apologetically. He ran a hand through his hair, looked over at her. 'Yeah,' he said. 'I didn't know I'd feel this… ugh, dirty, I don't know.'

Lily barely suppressed the scream threatening to burst out of her, just managed to avoid telling him that she felt the exact same way about her job every single day. Deciding that it would both be mildly inappropriate and get them nowhere, she nodded instead.

'Believe me, I understand you perfectly. I'll do my best to make it more tolerable.'

James raised an eyebrow, 'You think you can make flipping through binders to pick out women less disgusting?'

Lily shook her head, smiled ruefully. 'No. I just said I can make it tolerable.'

They got back to the studio about fifteen minutes later, after James finally admitted that he has something of a soft spot for brunettes ('And, uh, redheads,' he said, flushing all over). She decided to make it easier on him once they got up to her office, though, and get him talking about the personalities of the women he usually fell for. It was still gross, but it felt less so than grabbing the brunette and redhead binders and telling James to pick out the fittest women he saw and be done with it.

The car dropped them off in front of the studio, and they walked through the lobby, took the lift up to the fifth floor, and walked down the long corridor towards her office.

'I'm guessing you usually just date models or something?' Lily asked, rolling her eyes a bit as she closed the door behind them.

James raised an eyebrow. 'Because I'm a footballer, you mean?'

Lily shrugged, but it was exactly what she meant. She crossed the office to grab the binder stack.

'Maybe I need someone as vapid as I am?' There was an edge to his voice, a challenge, but he still somehow managed to sound like he was making an amusing observation.

Lily cleared her throat and sat down in her chair, laying the binders down in the centre of her desk. 'I never said you were vapid.'

'We both know it was implied,' James said, sitting down in the chair opposite her desk and leaning back, a smug smile on his face. 'And,' he raised his voice because Lily had opened her mouth to argue again, 'for the record, the last model I dated was training to be a civil rights lawyer.'

Lily had to fight to keep her jaw from dropping. 'Oh, uh… cool.'

'Yeah,' James said, his eyes shining with amusement now, ' _cool_.'

Lily cleared her throat again, started sorting through the binders to find the ones they needed, grabbed a notepad and pen from her desk drawer. 'So, Peter, our head executive producer, had the interns sort all the women by "aesthetic",' Lily put air quotes around it and barely kept the acid out of her voice, 'so, unfortunately, we have to start there. But if you want to tell me about the kinds of women you date, what they do, what they like, what their hobbies are, we can start looking for women that you might click with?'

James looked as though he might want to keep pressing on the model point, especially because he knew that she wanted to avoid it, but after a moment, his smile softened, and he ran his hand through his hair again.

'Uh,' he dropped his gaze for a moment, laughed awkwardly. 'I have… uh… a big personality and my life is really busy and my friends are a bit mad, and so I tend to be a little all over the place and that usually means that I lose interest in things and people pretty easily unless they're… fuck, this sounds so terrible now that I'm sitting here talking about it.'

'No,' Lily said, shaking her head, 'it doesn't. I feel the same way. I get bored really easily and then it just doesn't seem worth it to keep spending time with people.'

' _Yes,'_ James said, nodding. 'I just — I need someone that is going to keep me on my toes a bit.' He laughed again, rubbed his jaw while he thought. After a moment, he looked back up at her, his eyes shining with a smile.

'Someone really clever,' he said, 'someone that isn't afraid to fight with me, to tell me that I'm wrong, someone who challenges me and keeps things interesting. Someone that I have chemistry with, that I _click_ with. Someone with a similar sense of humour, that is able to put up with the fact that I can be _basically_ an overgrown child sometimes, especially when my brother is around.'

'Okay,' Lily said, nodding and scribbling notes, 'do you want a potential match to work in a particular kind of industry, or — '

'No,' James said, shaking his head. 'I don't care what she does. She doesn't even need a job she loves, you know, just something in her life that she's passionate about.'

Lily nodded. 'Okay, okay, perfect. So,' she tossed the notepad to the top of her desk, grabbed the stack of binders and stood up, 'we can look at these together, I can leave you to look at these alone — '

'We can look together,' James said, 'if that's alright?'

'Yeah,' Lily said, 'of course. Let's sit on the couch, though, then we can look together.'

Lily crossed the office, sat down on the couch near the door, and James settled into the seat beside her. He initially sat close, his knee bumping against hers as he sat down. He mumbled an apology, scooted over a few centimetres, and Lily felt a little tingly for a moment, just a moment, before she cleared her throat.

She handed James a pack of sticky flags, set a binder open between them. 'We can go through this one together and then go through the next ones separately if it takes forever.'

She laughed and James nodded, smiled nervously. 'We need fifty, right?'

Lily nodded. 'Right.'

They started moving through the profiles, reading the biographical details each woman provided and sticking flags on matches they thought would do well on the show. It was awkward at first, but after they'd selected the first few, it eventually started to feel easier. James was particularly drawn to a few women they looked at, a geography teacher named Liza Branson who coached her secondary school's football team, an investment banker named Claire Anderson who had travelled to more than a dozen countries in the last year, and a gorgeous redhead named Olivia Mark who worked retail during the day and spent her weekends volunteering across London.

It was late in the afternoon by the time they finished. Lily dropped the stack of profiles they'd chosen onto the small table beside the sofa, and smiled at James. 'There's that done,' she said, leaning back onto the slightly lumpy couch cushions. 'Do you have any questions about where we go from here?'

James nodded. 'Can you just tell me what to expect now that we've chosen our, uh, semi-finalists?'

Lily nodded. 'Mary, my assistant, is going to get all of these in order and start contacting the women we flagged. They'll come in for in person interviews over the next two weeks, and they'll get full medical and background screenings, including STI testing.'

James cleared his throat awkwardly, and Lily bit back a smile. 'It's mandatory for everyone on the show,' she said, 'we want to make sure that everyone is safe before they set foot on set.'

James nodded, ran a hand through his hair. 'No, no,' he said, 'that makes sense.'

'While we're interviewing, I'll be in touch periodically to go over a few details,' Lily said, and she slid into a tone that was more clipped than usual as she rattled off everything James needed to know. 'Date ideas, locations you'd like us to look into, wardrobe options, all those nitty gritty things that we need to get sorted out as soon as possible. Once we have all the interviews, I'll share all the interview tapes with you. The producers are going to filter out anyone who doesn't come back with clean screenings, medical or background or whatever, but we'll send the rest of the tapes over to you. You'll watch the tapes, send us your final list of twenty five, we'll match it up against the finalist list that our producers are going to put together, and then we'll meet up on set about two weeks later and start shooting. We might need to have you come in for a few in-person meetings, but most of this, as far as you're concerned, can be done via phone or email.'

James took a deep breath, nodded slowly, and Lily reached over, rested her hand on his. 'It's going to be alright, James,' she said, holding his gaze while she pressed her palm gently, but firmly, into his hand. 'I know it seems overwhelming, but really, you'll be brilliant.'

James turned his hand over, wound his fingers through hers, and squeezed. It was brief, barely lasted longer than a moment, but it was enough to set her heart pounding in her chest. James smiled at her then, a warm, genuine smile, and said. 'Thanks, Evans.'

Lily nodded, smiled back, and pulled her hand from his.


	4. Chapter 3

**once again, FF messes with my formatting. If you care about one email being formatting correctly, check out AO3 (same username)**

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She'd been worried, at first, that James might be a complete pain in the arse to work with, that he'd be snobbish or stuck up or (frankly) just kind of an idiot, but he was proving to be far easier to work with than Lily could have hoped. They were in touch fairly regularly via email over the next few weeks and managed to fly through her list of things to do. They hammered out a full list of locations for consideration, drafted a list of dates for each potential location, and, from everything that Lily had heard from the people over in Wardrobe, James had been nothing but sweet when he'd met with them a week later and discussed clothing and styling options.

Interviews with potential contestants took, as Lily had anticipated, two (dreadfully annoying) weeks. She sent all the tapes to James as promised, and, after a bit of badgering, she finally got him to report back on his final list of contestants. James' initial choices, Olivia, Liza, and Claire, all made it through the screenings and onto the final list, and James seemed happy about the other women they'd selected, too. He still seemed nervous about the show whenever they really talked about it, but having an appealing roster seemed to have helped.

As the final week before filming began, so too began the final crunch to get the last few preliminary details squared away. Last year, working with the contestants, Lily had run around like a chicken with her head cut off trying to get everything finalised, but with James, her list of things to do was, for the moment, blissfully short. It helped that she was really only responsible for one person (as opposed to the half dozen she'd had at the beginning of the last series), but it was largely due to the fact that she and James managed to work so efficiently that she was able to breathe a bit more this time around.

Though they'd been able to get most of their work done electronically, there were a few things, like promotional shoots and in-person meetings with some of the staff, that James had to come into the studio for. The final Monday before shooting was the last of such meetings, and Lily was sitting in the back of the studio car bright and early as she drove over to fetch him.

James walked out of his annoyingly impressive flat in Knightsbridge a few minutes after Lily arrived, his hair standing on end and a travel cup clutched in his hand. He hadn't bothered to actually dress himself, but then, he never did when she was picking him up in the car before seven. He always insisted that it didn't matter if he showed up to the studio in joggers and a t-shirt, because they always put him into some nice suit from Wardrobe if he had something "proper to do". She'd tried to fight him on it, tried to convince him that he should at _least_ look presentable when he got into the car to meet her, but James had just laughed her off and told her that she should just be glad that he'd put clothes on at all ('At the _most_ I'll sleep in trunks,' he'd said one morning when she was berating him for his outfit, 'so at least I put some proper trousers on.' Lily had scoffed, 'Those are hardly _proper trousers,_ Potter,' but she'd found her mind drifting to James in trunks more often than she'd been willing to admit that day).

Luckily, this was a fairly irregular occurrence, picking him up, so her imaginings were kept to a minimum.

James opened the door and slid into the car, pulled the door shut, and immediately let his head fall back onto the head rest. He groaned loudly and Lily, despite the fact that she knew he couldn't see her, just shook her head at him.

'It's so early,' he said, groaning again, apparently annoyed with her lack of response.

Lily snorted, pulled her mobile out of her bag on the seat beside her and checked the time. 'It's 7:04,' she said, 'hardly early.'

'It's early to me,' James said, sitting up just long enough to take a sip of his tea before he let his head fall back onto the seat again.

'Well, we have a full day of studio meetings today,' Lily said, clicking into her calendar and checking their schedule. 'You know that you're always booked fairly solid when we have to drag you into the studio.'

James groaned. 'Who decided this would be a good idea again?'

'You,' Lily said, laughing. 'You and Sirius.'

James sighed. 'I hate me and Sirius.'

Lily snorted. 'You told me yourself that you think you're going to meet the love of your life on here.'

'I was a fool,' James said. 'Nothing that makes you get up this bloody early could possibly help you find your soulmate.'

Lily shook her head. 'Do you enjoy being this fucking dramatic?'

James nodded. 'I do, actually.'

Lily sighed. 'Just drink your tea and stop your bloody whinging.'

James huffed, clearly hoping that he'd get a little more sympathy regarding his plight. Lily turned back to her phone. She hadn't opened her emails yet that morning, and she could tell from the number staring at her from the little red circle overtop her mail icon (sixty-three), that there was going to be a lot of bullshit in there.

She made the usual sweep of her inbox first, deleting emails from shops that had somehow gotten her contact information, archiving chain emails from work that she was positive she wouldn't need, but needed to have available just in case something bizarre happened and she _did_ need to know why Eliot in Sound had decided to go with one mic pack over another this year.

When her inbox was a bit clearer (twenty-seven), she was able to get a better sense of what had happened with the show since she'd last checked her email late last night before bed. There were a few emails from Mary confirming flight details for her and James for the next few weeks, an email from Pauline in Wardrobe confirming James' preferred styles for the warmer climates they'd soon be venturing to (Lily quickly replied to say that they could pop by that afternoon and James could confirm in person), a meeting reminder for their shoot later that morning, another meeting reminder for their midday with Marlene, and, at the very bottom of her inbox, an email from Peter that made her irritated before she'd even opened it.

Just seeing his bloody name in her inbox was enough to set her teeth on edge.

 _Date: 29 May 2017 03:13_

 _From: Peter Pettigrew (_ _prpettigrew .uk_ _)_

 _To: Lily Evans (_ _ljevans .uk_ _)_

 _Subject: fwd: re: re: Final Contestant List_

 _L — Here's final list of girls_

 _I know ur not on lady drama duty this yr, but u btr use what you know abt J to get us some good bits_

 _Ur 3rd series contingent on this yrs #s_

 _See u 8_

If it were possible to reach through her mobile and strangle him, she would have. Without a moment's hesitation, she would have done it.

She'd started grinding her teeth together when she saw that he'd opened his email with her bloody initial. His "I'm too busy and important to actually spell out words" way of typing his emails _just_ — no one was too fucking important to spell out words and she was sick of having to decipher what the fuck it was that he was talking about because he was too damn lazy to spell things properly.

She was incredibly busy and she'd never _once_ sent an email like that.

Though, she also wasn't an insufferable twat. Maybe you have to be an insufferable twat to send emails like that.

But more than her initial reaction, it was what Peter was asking her to do that was pissing her off more than anything else. She hated this part of this job. Hated it more than she could even begin to articulate.

She never was particularly proud of the things that she'd had to do during the last series, and, when she really let herself think about it, she wasn't sure why she did most of them. Yes, the money was certainly a motivating factor for a lot of it, especially where there were bonuses involved, but Lily had done things last series that she didn't _ever_ see herself doing. Getting a woman to sob on national television, goading women into treating one another like shit, generally encouraging (or, at least, refusing to discourage, which was just as bad) the air of sexism that floated around the show… she ranked her tenure with _Eligible_ as some of the worst months of her life, and yet here she was _._

No matter what she said to the contrary, no matter how much she hated it, she knew that she was here because she'd chosen to be.

No matter what she'd done last year, she'd hoped (foolishly, apparently), that moving into the bachelor side of things would mean that she could get out of doing some of the worst things that she'd had to do when she was working with the contestants. She'd hoped that she would be able to just work with James, help guide him through this… _unique_ experience, that she wouldn't have to do any of the more morally reprehensible things that she'd done last year.

Apparently, that was not to be.

But her relationship with James wasn't going to be like the relationship that she'd had with the contestants last year — she barely knew most of them. What she'd done was fucking terrible, but at least she hadn't established something of a real rapport with them. There were so many producers on the contestant side that she (probably more as a defence mechanism than anything else) allowed herself to believe that she never actually hurt anyone that she was that close with. With James, there was no way she could even _begin_ to believe that.

She was the only producer that he was working with, the only one that, once filming started, he was going to be in touch with every single day. They were going to talk and spend time together and Lily was going to have to be there for damn near everything, and she couldn't — she couldn't act like this wasn't a violation like she'd been able to do last year. In having a closer working relationship with him, her excuses had effectively evaporated.

And anyway, she already liked him — he was nice and easy to work with and she didn't want to hurt him. She hadn't _wanted_ to hurt the others either, but —

Talking herself around in circles about it wasn't going to fix a damn thing. She was going to have to make a decision one way or the other, and what she'd done last year could have absolutely no bearing on this decision at all because every time that she even thought about it, it was only so that she could use it as some fucking kind of excuse. She was going to have to suck it and up and just fucking decide how this series was going to be and then be done with it.

One day, she would be able to just close this chapter of her life altogether, just walk out of that fucking office and quit, and then she'd never have to think about it again.

She wasn't sure when that day would come, but fuck if she didn't hope it was just around the corner.


	5. Chapter 4

**I've moved house, my new place is a fucking disaster, and I'm getting ready to run out the door to Ikea because every time I move, I somehow end up at Ikea.**

 **Enjoy this chapter, my friends. I know there are things waiting for me on Tumblr - I'll get to it, I swear.**

* * *

When they arrived at the studio fifteen minutes later, James was no more awake, but he was, at least, a bit more rested. Still, she'd had to grab his arm after she climbed out of the car and tug him out onto the pavement before he had time to put up a real fight, fold himself back into the car, and resume his nap.

'What are we even _doing here_ this early?' He dropped a heavy arm across her shoulders, leaned down and rested his cheek on top of her head. She sighed, pushed him lightly in the chest so that he was standing up straight and started walking towards the station building.

'We have meetings,' she said, 'and you have a shoot. Do you _read_ the emails I send you?'

James yawned, 'Sometimes,' in response, and she almost elbowed him hard in the ribs.

Instead, she sighed, opened the front door, and pulled him through.

'Good morning, Stan!' She smiled at the tall, rail-thin kid behind the welcome desk and he beamed at her.

'Morning, Ms Evans. Mr Potter's tired again, I see?'

Lily grinned in a playfully exasperated way. 'He's always tired.'

Stan shook his head at her. 'You should let him get some rest.'

James shot Stan a grin. 'Cheers, Stan.'

This time she did elbow him in the ribs.

They climbed into the lift, James still rubbing his side and muttering dramatically about how he was sure he was going to bruise and wouldn't that mess up the shirtless shots they were definitely planning to take of him today and god forbid everyone finds out that the reason he's been injured is because his producer is mean and violent.

Lily rolled her eyes, jabbed the button for the fifth floor, and told James to fuck off.

'Where are we headed to first?' James asked as the lift doors opened and Lily began walking swiftly down the corridor towards her office.

'I'm half tempted not to tell you,' she said, casting a glance over her shoulder at him. 'Serve you right for not reading your damn email.'

'Oh, come on, now, Evans,' James said, and she knew without looking at him that he was smiling that stupid smile at her, the one that he always gave her when he was trying to win her over. 'You don't want me to show up to this looking like a complete arse, do you?'

'Actually,' Lily pulled her keys out of her trouser pocket, unlocked her office door, 'I think that's exactly what I'd like this morning.'

They walked into her office and James fell down onto the sofa, kicked his feet up onto the table in the one space that wasn't covered with binders and stacks of paper. 'Well, I might as well just stay here, then,' he said. 'If I'm not prepared, there's no way that I can contribute anything productive to the — '

Lily grabbed a notepad and her "Meeting with Peter" folder off her desk and walked back across the office, kicking James' legs off the table as she went. She grabbed his arm, ignored his protests of 'Now I have bruised shins _and_ bruised abs!' and dragged him out of the office, pulling the door shut behind her.

'Evans,' he smirked down at her as he fell into step beside her, his arm still firmly in her grip, 'I like a bit of manhandling, but this is excessive.'

She groaned, dropped his arm, and James laughed, slung his now free arm around her shoulders. 'So, really. Where are we going?'

'I'm not telling you,' she said, 'I'm sick of sending you emails that you don't read and I'm tired of prepping you for things that can you prep yourself for.'

James sighed. 'Alright, well, if I look like an idiot — '

'It's on you,' she said, shooting him a look. 'I came prepared.'

She held up the folder in her hand and was careful not to show him the name she'd scribbled on the label.

'You are so mean to me,' he said, shaking his head at her. 'Why are you so mean to me?'

'Oh my _fucking_ god,' she practically shouted it in the corridor, but she couldn't bring herself to care, not when he was being this ridiculous.

James just laughed, pulled her closer to his side as they continued towards Peter's office. She hated him, really she did, but she couldn't help smiling at him when the prat was looking at her like that.

James spent the rest of the walk trying to get Lily to tell him where the meeting was, tried all the tricks that he could think of, from pretending that he didn't care anyway and she should just tell him because this game was _so stupid, Evans,_ to promising her everything under the sun if she would just please, please tell him. She managed (with very little effort) to resist every one of his proposals, and it wasn't until they turned down the final hallway towards Peter's office that James finally hummed with understanding.

'Pettigrew's,' he said, his voice dropping to a low, almost conspiratorial whisper. 'What are we meeting with him for?'

Lily raised an eyebrow at him. 'You'll find out, won't you?'

James groaned, annoyed, and Lily barely bit back a laugh as she slid out from under James' arm, reached up, and knocked on Peter's door.

There was a quiet rustling from behind the door, and James turned, raised an amused eyebrow at her. Lily quickly turned away for fear of laughing audibly, focused her gaze on her shoes instead. After a moment, Peter shouted, 'Come in,' and Lily pushed open the door.

Peter's office always stressed Lily out on an entirely new level. Part of it, of course, was because he held her entire career in her hands and he didn't seem to like her, but mostly it was because his office was always just a complete fucking disaster that didn't seem to even be _vaguely_ organised.

There were stacks of paper on every flat surface, half of them with coffee stains on them, and she didn't know how he managed to find anything when he was looking for it. Though, honestly, maybe he didn't find anything — it would explain why he emailed her and everyone else on the staff eight hundred times about the same fucking thing.

Peter was sitting behind his desk, his mobile in his hand, and he didn't look up when Lily and James pushed open the door. He just sort of tipped his head in acknowledgement of their presence, and Lily did her very best to bite back the look of irritation that she was desperate to shoot at James.

'Good morning, Peter,' Lily said, as she and James walked into his office, sat down in the chairs opposite his desk. 'How're you doing this morning?'

Peter sighed, finished typing out whatever he was typing on his mobile, tossed it haphazardly onto his desk before he finally looked up at them. He was lucky the desk was covered in as much paper as it was, because Lily was sure that he would have cracked it otherwise.

'Alright,' he said. 'But let's get to it kid, I've got a lot to get through this morning.'

She had half a mind to remind him that _he_ was the one that had decided they'd needed an additional meeting outside their regularly scheduled production meetings, but, as usual, bit her tongue.

'Right,' she said, and she opened the folder in her lap, pulled out the agenda that Peter's assistant, Angela, had sent her the Friday before. She scanned the list quickly to refresh her memory, turned it over on her lap when she noticed James reading over her shoulder. He huffed quietly from beside her and she bit back a smile.

'Regarding travel, we're all set. Mary's booked airlines and hotels for our side of production through the duration of the show, and I know that she was coordinating with Mallory on the contestant side to make sure that all their stuff is booked as well. So nothing to update you on there.'

Peter's phone started buzzing from the stack of papers he'd tossed it onto earlier, and he snatched it up from the desk, started typing away.

Lily, unwilling to sit here and waste her damn time watching him type, carried on.

'We've finalised James' payment with Accounting and he signed the updated contract that Legal sent over last week. We've also had a number of brands start contacting us about getting James to wear or use their things on the show, far more than we had for the first series, so I think that we'll be able to make some cuts where Wardrobe is concerned. I know you wanted to cut back on the budget a bit, especially since we're going to a few more extravagant places this year….'

She trailed off, gave Peter the opportunity to jump in and say anything, but he just continued typing away on his mobile.

'Other than that,' Lily said, turning the list over again briefly and looking over it, 'I don't think there was anything else I needed to tell you about that can't wait until the regular production meeting on Wednesday. Angela just mentioned that you needed me to bring James….'

She trailed off again, and this time, Peter did look up, but he looked right past Lily as though she weren't even there. He leaned across his desk, extended his hand towards James. 'Peter Pettigrew,' he said, smiling, 'Executive Producer. It's nice to finally meet you.'

James extended his arm, and Peter looked momentarily surprised that James hadn't stood up to shake his hand. 'We've met actually,' James said coolly, 'In one of the early meetings with my solicitors before I agreed to sign on.'

Peter nodded, 'Ah, that's right,' and dropped James' hand. Lily could tell that he didn't actually remember, and was highly amused at his poor attempt at saving face.

'So, Mr Potter,' Peter paused to give James the space to correct him and ask that Peter address him more casually, but James just sat silently, a neutral expression on his face as he waited for Peter to finish the rest of his sentence. Peter cleared his throat.

'Mr Potter. I wanted to meet and see if we could go over some of your ideas for the series, see if we couldn't leverage some of your connections for the show?'

'Well, Lily and I have already gone over this at length,' James said, 'and I think that we've managed to work out what seems like a decent plan between the two of us. I understand that she shares that in the weekly Production meetings, correct?' He turned and raised an enquiring eyebrow at Lily and she nodded, cleared her throat.

He was going to kill her. James and his apparent need to one-up her fucking boss was going to give her a stress related heart attack in the middle of Peter's office and he didn't care.

She was going to _murder_ him the moment they left this office.

'Well, her updates have been a bit sparse in those meetings of late,' Peter said, laughing. 'Wouldn't you say, kid? Not much to tell us?'

He spared a fleeting glance for Lily, which normally would have annoyed her, but today was her saving grace because there was no fucking way that she was hiding the anger she was feeling right now.

'Not as many fires to put out this year,' Lily said, trying to keep the coldness out of her voice as best she could. 'James and I have — '

'Anyway,' Peter turned back to James. 'I just wanted to meet you, have a chat, make sure Lil is treating you right. This move is a big jump for her, working with our lead, so I wanted to make sure she wasn't in over her head.'

'I assure you,' James said, and there was no mistaking the anger in his voice. 'Lily is exceptional.'

'You don't need to say that just because she's here, Mr. Potter,' Peter said. He laughed and Lily let herself fantasise about bashing his head on the desk.

'You know,' James leaned back in his seat, and the coldness of his manner now was shocking — she hadn't known James long, sure, but she'd never expected that he would be able to act like this. 'You're being a real arsehole. Lily is a superb producer, I'm lucky to be working with her, and you're lucky to have her here.'

Peter leaned back in his chair, studied James for a moment, before he cleared his throat. 'Well, I'm glad things are going well. If you'll both excuse me, I'd like to start preparing for my next meeting.'

Lily was on her feet the moment Peter finished speaking, didn't say a word as she tucked her things under her arm. She had half a mind to grab James' arm and drag him out into the corridor, but deciding that _that_ probably wouldn't be the best course of action, she just walked as steadily as she could across the office.

As soon as she pulled Peter's door shut behind them, she rounded on him.

'What the _fuck_ was that?' she hissed, grabbing him by the elbow and leading him down the corridor so that they could fight without Peter hearing them.

'I don't like the way he talks to you,' James said. 'And I know that you're not going to say anything about it, but I'll be damned if he's going to talk to you like that in front of me.'

She'd expected him to deny that he'd done anything, and his immediate defence knocked her off balance for a moment.

She'd already had her whole speech prepared.

'I don't need you swooping in in my defence whenever you think I've been wronged, James,' she said. 'I can handle myself.'

'No one said you couldn't,' he hissed, 'but you and I both know that your hands are a bit tied where Pratigrew is concerned.'

'Pratigrew?! Are you _twelve_?!'

'Find the lie, Evans.'

'You're unfuckingbelievable, you are,' she snapped, and she doubled her speed, determined to at least get into her office before she started properly shouting at him. She was absolutely _livid_ with him, and she was not, under any circumstance, having this fight in the middle of a corridor where anyone could see.

'You can be as cross with me as you like,' James said, matching her pace and falling quickly into step beside her, 'but I mean it, Evans. He can't fucking treat you like that.'

'So you're just going to pull _rank_? Do this whole "Mr posh-footballer" bullshit — '

'Oh come on,' he laughed, 'I didn't do that.'

She wrenched open the door to her office, shot him an exasperated look as he marched past her. 'James!'

'Whaaat? Come _on_ , are you seriously this angry?'

She walked into the office behind him, slammed the door behind her, and finally, _finally,_ shouted at him. 'Yes!'

'Why? And don't,' he said, holding his hand up when she opened her mouth furiously, 'don't say that it's because I think you can't defend yourself, because we both know that's bollocks.'

'Because,' she was really shouting now, 'Peter might be a bit nicer to me when you're around, but you're not always going to be around, are you? And now he's going to be a complete _twat_ whenever it's just me. You've made my life that much fucking harder because _you,'_ she reached out and jabbed him in the chest with her index finger, 'couldn't keep it together for two seconds.'

He had least had the decency to look a bit sorry now, but she could also tell that he wasn't ready to give up the fight.

'What would you have rather me done?' he said, throwing his hands up. 'Sit there and do nothing while he treats you like shit? Get all fucking chummy with him after he couldn't even look you in the eye the entire time we were fucking in there? Tell me what to do, Evans, because I really have no fucking idea.'

'Maybe just fucking _think_ before you start doing shit! Maybe _ask_ me before you start trying to be all bloody noble next time! _Maybe_ you think about the long term repercussions of your actions!'

She'd stepped closer, her voice rising in volume as she shouted at him, and now they were so close that she had to tip her head back a bit to look him in the eye.

'I can't believe that you're seriously sitting here telling me that I shouldn't have stood up for you.'

'There's just a way to go about it and _that_ was not fucking it!'

'That still leaves the question of what you'd rather me do,' James snapped. 'Because we both know that this is going to fucking happen again, Evans, so just tell me what the fuck to do!'

'I'll deal with it! I deal with it every fucking day!'

James laughed, shook his head at her. 'That was dealing with it?! Sitting there and taking it?!'

'He controls my _job,_ James. I can work around him and curse him left, right, and bloody centre in my head, but if I want to keep paying my bloody bills —'

'So you're just going to let him talk to you however the fuck he wants because he employs you?!'

'You really don't fucking get it, do you,' Lily hissed. 'You don't understand _at all_ what it fucking takes to be a woman in this fucking business. If I step "out of line" or I start to look "difficult," suddenly I'm not only out of a job here, but I'm fucking blacklisted _everywhere._ I love this business, James, I love it _a lot,_ and so it doesn't matter how much I hate Peter, which I do, or how much I would like to be working in something other than reality tv, because fucking believe me, I would give my fucking _soul_ for a real show — if I want to get a real fucking show, I have to get a good reputation and I'm not going to get a good reputation if I start calling out one of the most powerful people in the business.

'Like him or not,' Lily said, raising her voice because James had opened his mouth, an absolutely furious look on his face, 'that's the fucking truth. His parents had money and daddy bought him a fucking studio and we all have to just deal with it.

'I understand that you want to swoop in here like some knight in shining armour,' she let her volume come back down to a reasonable level, let her tone soften just a bit, 'but god fucking damn it James, at least understand me when I'm telling you that my options are very limited and that you're just making it worse for me when you can't keep your mouth shut.'

James was quiet for a long moment, his brow furrowed in obvious annoyance, his eyes trained on his shoes as he shifted his weight back and forth. Eventually, he sighed heavily, let his eyes find hers again.

'I'm sorry,' he said. 'I — whatever my reasons were, I shouldn't have — not without talking to you. I'm sorry.'

Lily nodded and James continued, 'I just need you to tell me what I'm supposed to do in these situations, Evans, because I c — I don't want to let him talk to you like that _ever._ Tell me what you want me to do and I'll do it.'

Lily sighed. 'It's not that simple. There isn't just one answer — '

'I know,' he said, 'but how should I handle it? What's best for you? Because honestly my answer is just fucking strangle him and be done with it, but somehow I don't think you agree.'

She breathed a laugh, nodded. 'Catch me on the right day, though, and I might agree with that.'

They were silent for a long minute, and Lily realised how quiet everything sounded after all their damn shouting. She also became aware of how close together they were standing — she took a small step back, pressed her fingertips into her forehead before she let her eyes find his again.

'Just let me handle it. We're going to be travelling a lot soon and, I mean, honestly, I won't even have to see that much of him. If you _really_ feel like you need to say something, just — honestly, anything would be better than calling him an arsehole, James. _Anything.'_

'So 'useless fuckwit' counts as an improvement in your book, then?' He sent her a cheeky grin and she smiled in spite of herself.

'Just say something like "I don't appreciate the way you're speaking to Evans" or whoever you happen to hear him spewing his usual sexist shit about. I know that you don't want to be polite, and believe me, I wish that I could just kick him right in his fucking balls for treating me the way he does, but, unfortunately, kicks to the balls don't pay my fucking rent.'

James chuckled, ran a hand through his hair. 'Alright, I suppose I could do that.'

'Yeah?'

'Yeah,' he smiled at her. 'Are we done arguing now?'

She sighed. 'For now. I'm sure we'll find something else to have a row about before the day's out.'

'Well, I'm glad we're done now at any rate,' James said, rubbing his side. 'My ribs hurt from all that shouting.'

'Oh my fucking god,' Lily pushed his shoulder, marched around her desk and sat down behind her computer. 'You are so stupid.'

James laughed loudly, dropped into the seat opposite her desk. She barely resisted the urge to throw a pencil at his head.

'You can just tell me that I'm hilarious, Evans. We both know that you're feeling better now because of how "stupid" I am.'

'Let's just get a few more things sorted,' she said, biting back a smile. 'We've got to meet Mary in ten.'

She saw James smile at her from the corner of her eye as she opened up her email, but she refused to give him the satisfaction of knowing he was right.


	6. Chapter 5

The rest of the morning was a breeze after the complete trainwreck that was the meeting with Peter and her ensuing argument with James. They managed to meet up with Mary, finalise the last few details in person, and James even stopped grumbling about his bruised ribs as they dressed and re-dressed him for the promo shoot.

She was thankful he'd finally shut up about it, but she knew that he was only doing it because he could see that she had already reached the end of her nonsense rope that morning.

The shoot, thankfully, didn't require Lily to actually do that much — they'd gone over all the executive decisions the week before, what colour palette they were going for, what kind of feel they wanted the adverts to have, so she largely just sat in a chair out of frame and watched as James stripped over and over again and struggled to tie his tie. She probably could have gone back to her office and gotten some work done, but there wasn't anything _so_ pressing that meant that she couldn't be here.

And anyway, she was still too livid about their meeting with Peter to really focus that much if left to her own devices.

She knew that Peter was a complete fucking shithead, knew that he never seemed to value the work that she or any of the other women on the team were putting in, knew that he loved to call her stupid names like "kid" because he was a sexist arsehole, but there was something especially infuriating about that way that it had unfolded today.

Peter had never, even on his worst days, talked to her like that in front of any of the talent. He was a complete twat, but he knew, or seemed to at any rate, that talking to his staff in front of people like that was not likely to go over well.

Maybe he thought that he and James were going to be in some kind of league together, that they'd both act like they were kings of the bloody universe because they both positively bled money and what else do you do but treat other people like utter shite when you're that rich? Whatever he thought, it was clear to him now that he was wrong, that James fucking Potter was not here for his attitude, and, what's more, that he was going to call him out on it.

Lily wasn't sure how that was going to work out for them long term, James' attitude. James, she was sure, would be fine, but she was already preparing herself to catch more difficulties on the production end because Peter was upset about the way their meeting had gone.

She pulled her pen out from behind her ear and started scribbling out some contingency plans while she watched James unbutton the white shirt he was wearing in favour of the burgundy one one of the stylists was now holding towards him.

She didn't think that Peter would sink the show — that would ultimately be a hit to his own wallet — but she wouldn't be surprised if he didn't find ways to make Lily's life that much more difficult when it came to the everyday management of things. He might ask for more reports, regular updates, might ask that she get approval for things that she wouldn't otherwise need approval for — it would lead to all kinds of delays, would make her day to day work life absolutely fucking annoying, and it would force her to do busy work that, quite frankly, was not her damn job.

Worst of all, these things weren't anything that Lily could legitimately complain about, and that's precisely why Lily thought that he might start there. He'd totally and completely lord this over her, get her to do whatever he liked, and she couldn't say a damn word about it. At least, not without looking like a whiny bitch.

Fucking Pratigrew.

The shoot wrapped just before lunchtime. James frowned at her as he pulled off the sapphire blue shirt the stylists had stuck him in.

'You going to feed me at some point, Evans?' he asked as he crossed the room and grabbed his t-shirt off the chair beside her, 'I'm wasting away.' He patted his stomach before it disappeared under the fabric and she rolled her eyes at him.

'You're fine, you prat, stop whinging.'

He toed off the dress shoes he was wearing, slid off his trousers, and Lily averted her eyes. 'You could go into the dressing room you know,' she said, 'you don't need to show off.'

James grinned at her as he stepped into his joggers. 'And what exactly do you think I'm showing off, Evans?'

'Oh fuck off,' she said, 'you know damn well.'

James just raised an eyebrow at her as he leaned down to grab his trainers. 'Something to share, Evans?'

Lily gathered her folders in her arms and stood while James pulled on his shoes. 'Absolutely not. You've got a big enough head as it is.'

James laughed and Lily smacked him in the chest with her paperwork.

James turned, waved his thanks to the photographer and the stylists, and fell into step beside Lily as they headed back out of the studio. 'Seriously,' he said, 'are you going to feed me? This is really important, Evans.'

'Oh my fucking god,' she pulled her mobile out of her pocket, flicked through her calendar, 'we've got one more meeting. Can you last another hour?'

'Can you make it a lunch meeting? I'm starving.'

He did his best to pout at her and it took everything she had not to crack a smile.

'You're wearing pyjamas,' she said.

James sighed. 'There are _not_ pyjamas. They're — '

She held up her hand, cut him off before they travelled down this very, _very_ well worn road. 'I'll see what I can do,' she said, 'but I'm not making any promises.'

* * *

Marlene, it turned out, was more than willing to make their meeting a lunch meeting. She'd been so enthusiastic about it, actually, that Lily had almost wanted to convince Marlene to give her something of a hard time so that James didn't think that he could just get whatever he wanted when he asked for it.

 _Lily Evans: He's going to think he can just do whatever the fuck he wants, Mar. You better make it seem like you had to rearrange your whole day for this_

She could practically feel Marlene's rolled eyes in her response — _Stop being stupid. I'm starving anyway, so it all worked out x_

She really could be more helpful, this fucking best friend of hers.

'I don't know where you expect to go dressed like that,' Lily said, gesturing towards his trousers as they headed down towards the other end of the building towards Marlene's office. 'We can't go anywhere decent.'

James laughed. 'Who needs decent? We can just go to Nando's.'

'Oh for fucks sake,' Lily said, laughing. 'I hate you.'

She'd made the mistake a few weeks back of telling him that Nando's had been forever ruined for her a few years ago when some guy from uni had taken her there for dinner. He'd eaten way, way too much, gotten colossally sick, and it hadn't mattered how much she loved the damn place, she hadn't been able to even _hear_ about Peri Peri chicken since without feeling a bit ill.

James grinned, stepped closer to her, and dropped an arm around her shoulders. 'You do not.'

'Well, I want to,' she said. 'Surely that counts for something.'

James just shook his head at her. 'Sorry, doesn't count for shit.'

She nudged him in the ribs and stepped out from under his arm.

Marlene's door was slightly ajar when they got there a few minutes later, and Lily knocked on the door as she pushed it open and stepped inside Marlene's office.

Marlene held up her finger at them before either Lily or James said anything, and finished furiously typing whatever it was that she was working on. A moment later, her fingers froze over the keyboard, her eyes moving quickly over the screen, before she slammed her pinky into the return key, and she turned, smiled at them in the doorway.

'Lils,' she smiled at Lily as she got to her feet, crossed the office, and held her hand out towards James. 'And Mr Potter. Nice to meet you, I'm Marlene McKinnon.'

The truly impressive thing about Marlene was that she was exactly who she seemed to be on tv. She was taller than you expected and somehow even better looking, with her long, shining blonde hair and bright blue eyes, but the Marlene the country watched every Monday on _Eligible_ (and Friday nights on her self-titled chat show) was the same Marlene you met when you were in front of her. She was clever and warm and _dead_ hilarious and just had this air about her that made you feel comfortable — like you already knew her, like you were talking to an old friend.

It was why so many people felt comfortable going onto her show and why they ended up going along with the ridiculous things that she sometimes asked them to do. Even the most notoriously stiff celebrities loosened up when they went on her show.

James grinned at her, shook her hand. 'Just James, please. Nice to meet you, Marlene.'

'Sorry we weren't able to meet earlier,' Marlene said, but James waved it off.

'If you've been half as busy as Evans, believe me, I get it. She's been swamped.'

'Evans?' Marlene didn't even try to hide the smirk she flashed at Lily. Lily _wanted_ to tell Marlene to go fuck herself, but James was already looking between them, curious expression on his face, and she really didn't need to go down this road right now.

She shrugged instead. 'It's what he calls me.'

Marlene's grin widened. 'Cute.'

It wasn't going to be fucking cute when Lily strangled her.

'Thanks for agreeing to make this a lunch meeting,' Lily said, and though Marlene's eyebrow twitched a bit at the sudden change in subject, she didn't say anything about it.

'Like I said,' Marlene said, grinning. 'I'm bloody starving anyway, so it works for me. Though,' she shot James a look, 'I don't know where we're going to go with you dressed like that.'

Lily turned and raised a cheeky eyebrow at James, an _I told you you needed to properly dress yourself when you come to the studio_ look. James, the bastard, didn't even look fazed.

'I know a great place,' he said, 'down near Southwark station.'

Marlene shot him a look as she grabbed her bag off the hook behind her door. 'It better be worth it if you're going to make us walk that far.'

'Trust me,' James said, 'it is.'


	7. Chapter 6

**it's icklewolfiekins' birthday and I promised a chapter to celebrate. You know I gotta keep my promises.**

* * *

James' 'great place' was a small kebab shop that was, thankfully, only a ten minute walk away from the studio.

He beamed at the man behind the counter as he walked in. 'Adil,' James crossed the shop in three long strides, reached out and shook Adil's hand. 'How're you, mate? It's been a while.'

'It's been a few days, James,' Adil said, laughing. 'Hardly a while.'

'Well, it feels like it's been ages,' James said.

Adil just rolled his eyes. 'That's because you used to be here every damn day.'

James shot him a wide grin and Adil chuckled. 'What can I get ya, mate?'

'I'll take a lamb doner, and whatever they're having.'

James dug in his pocket and pulled out his wallet, started running his finger along the edge while he waited for them to order.

Lily shot him a look. 'You're not paying for this.'

'It's my place. I picked it.'

'I don't care, you're not — '

Marlene cut them off with a roll of her eyes. 'We'll expense it, James, it's fine. Chicken doner wrap, please.'

James humphed at her and Lily opted to ignore him, turning to Adil and giving him a smile. 'I'll take a lamb doner as well. Thanks.'

Lily pulled out her credit card, the one she reserved for work purchases to avoid confusing things at the end of every month, and handed it over. She turned to James and Marlene as she tucked her card back into her wallet and Adil moved back behind the counter and started making their kebabs.

'Where do you want to chat?' Lily asked. 'It's a nice day, maybe Waterloo Green?'

Marlene nodded, 'Sure. We'll have to keep our voices low depending on how crowded it is, but I'm sure it'll be fine.'

They both turned to James and he just shrugged. 'I'm fine with whatever as long as I have one of Adil's kebabs.'

Adil snorted with laughter behind the counter and James sent him a grin.

A few minutes later, they were walking back down The Cut towards the Green with the best smelling kebabs in the world (or, at least, in London) in their hands. Lily hadn't been _that_ hungry before they'd left the studio, but now that she was staring down at this fucking food, she was absolutely ravenous.

They walked towards the benches in the midst of the cluster of trees in the centre of the park, sat on a pair of benches beside the water. There were a few people littered through the park, walking on the path between the gates, sitting in the grass and tucking in to whatever they'd brought with them, but there weren't so many people that Lily worried they'd be overheard.

They weren't running some fucking top secret mission, but it made all their lives easier when stories didn't leak into the press before they were ready.

'So,' James said, gathering his kebab up in his hands, 'is this another "getting to know you" meeting or?'

Marlene hummed mid-bite and nodded. 'Essentially,' she said, sort of half shrugging. 'We'll be working closely together over the next few weeks. It's in everyone's best interest if we get on. Or at least try to.'

'Well, you already seem less bloody offensive than _some people_ I've met.' Lily started shaking her head at him halfway through his sentence, but James, of course, hadn't been deterred.

Marlene raised a questioning eyebrow at Lily and she sighed. 'He's not keen on Pettigrew.'

'Ah,' Marlene shot James a grin. 'Well, who is? He's a dick.'

James shot a look at Lily like _see?_ before he returned Marlene's smile. 'I think we'll get on just fine, you and I, McKinnon.'

Marlene tipped her wrap at him. 'I quite agree, James.'

They sat in the park for another hour or so, chatting amicably about the show — what James could expect once they started travelling to their various locations, how he and Marlene would be expected to work together when they were filming. Marlene played something of a strange role — host, romantic advisor, executive producer — and it could be confusing for the leads to figure out what role she was playing in any given moment. She tried to keep lines clearly drawn between her duties with the show, especially between her on-camera responsibilities and her production ones, but when you have your hands in as many things as Marlene did, things were bound to get a bit tangled. It didn't matter which role she was playing most of the time, but there were times when her romantic advice was overshadowed by her interests as a producer, something that Marlene was determined to make clear.

'I'm not saying that we won't uh… nudge you in a few directions over the course of filming,' Marlene said as they stood up just gone one and started gathering their things, 'but the decisions are ultimately your own.'

James frowned. 'What do you mean, "nudge me in a few directions"?'

'Well,' Marlene glanced at Lily before she continued, 'nothing major. You'll still have final say over the main women that you decide to keep, but if, for some reason, some of the women prove to be more… entertaining than others, we'll encourage you to keep them on longer than you might otherwise would have.'

'So you're going to tell me who I can and can't keep?' It sounded more like disbelief than an outright accusation, but the hint of annoyance in his voice was still impossible to miss.

'Not — ' Marlene sighed, brushed a piece of hair out of her eyes while she collected her thoughts. They were nearly out of the park when Marlene spoke again. 'We wouldn't tell you to get rid of anyone that you genuinely liked,' she said, 'nothing like that. We just know that in a field of twenty five women, there are bound to be a number that you don't really click with, and in those cases, we're interested, from a production standpoint, in keeping the contestants that make the show more exciting for viewers.'

James was quiet as they walked up the path and back out onto the pavement beside the main road. Finally he sighed, sort of shrugged. 'Well, as long as you can't tell me that I have to get rid of women I like, I guess it doesn't really matter. If we _really_ don't get on are you allowed to override my decisions?'

'Only once,' Marlene said. James' brow furrowed, but Marlene was quick to head him off. 'We are allowed to designate one woman each year that must stay on until the fifth week. Only one woman. And there are certainly ways for you to navigate around her if you genuinely don't get on with her.'

James was quiet for a moment before he turned to Lily. 'And you'll know who we're keeping from week to week? You'll be the one to tell me who's got to stay or whatever?'

Lily nodded. She wasn't sure why it really mattered, but anything she could do to reassure him.

'Are you going to tell me when we're filming the selection room shots, or?'

'Around then, yeah,' Lily said. 'We'll want you to pick the women that you know you definitely want to carry forward and then we'll pass along the names we'd like you to consider for the remaining slots if there are vacancies.'

James hummed quietly, nodded as they paused at the junction and waited for the signal to change. Lily could see Marlene's eyes flicking between the two of them, watching James for any sign of negative reaction, any sense that this was turning out to be something other than what he'd signed up for, but she wasn't sure why Marlene was bothering to pay her any mind. Marlene already knew that Lily thought the show was utter shit.

The signal switched and James turned to look at Lily as they started across the street. 'I guess that makes sense,' he said. 'I'm fine with whatever as long as you aren't cutting out people that I like or making me keep people that are absolutely horrid.'

'Yeah, no,' Lily said, 'we wouldn't. It would defeat the whole bloody purpose of the damn thing, don't you think?'

James laughed, nudged her with his elbow as they started up the road towards the studio. She grinned and nudged him back.

They said goodbye to Marlene when they got into the studio, and Lily and James popped round Wardrobe to confirm some of Pauline's selections in person before they walked back to Lily's office and called a car to take James home.

'What are you going to do for the rest of the day?' James leaned up against her door frame while they waited for Stan to call and say his car was out front. 'Aren't you basically done getting all my details in order?'

'Yeah,' Lily turned away from her email and looked at him. 'All our details are solid — I just have to round with Mary and confirm everything. And, while we're talking about it, have you got any questions? Anything come up that you're worried about or just curious about?'

James shook his head. 'I expect it's the kind of thing that you figure out once you're in it, isn't it?' he said. 'I don't have questions now, but I'm sure I'll have them once I'm in the thick of it.'

Lily nodded. 'And you know that you can come to me with any questions or concerns that you might have as they crop up? That's my job — to make sure that this experience is working for you.'

James flashed her a smile and Lily bit the inside of her lip. 'Yeah, Evans,' he said, 'I know.'

Her desk phone rang and she pulled her gaze from his, grabbed the receiver and pressed it to her ear. 'Lily Evans…. Okay, great, Stan, thanks…. Cheers.'

She set the phone back onto the base and grinned at James. 'Car's downstairs,' she said, and James nodded.

'I'll see you Thursday, then.' He raised his hand in farewell and walked off down the corridor.


	8. Chapter 7

**and because I can't remember if I promised one chapter or two, here's another for good measure.**

 **When we're back on Sunday, we're finally travelling!**

* * *

It didn't take Lily long after James left to decide that she was absolutely done working for the day. She'd sent Mary a few final confirmation emails, but, seeing as everything was in order and there was absolutely nothing else that she could really do, she decided to just give it up as a bad job and head home for the night.

She grabbed her desk phone off the hook and dialled Marlene's extension, cradled the phone on her shoulder while she closed out of her applications and shut down her computer. Marlene picked up on the second ring.

'This is Marlene.'

'Hey, have you got plans tonight?'

'I don't think so? Nothing I couldn't shift around, at least.'

Lily snorted. 'You don't _think so_? How don't you know?'

'Well, you know my social calendar, Lil,' Marlene said. 'I'm absurdly popular.'

'Just fucking absurd, more like,' Lily muttered and Marlene laughed.

'Why're you asking, love?'

'Wanted to see if you wanted to pop round tonight. Have a last movie night before the madness starts. I know it's not our usual night, but….'

They'd first started these movie nights a few years back, after Lily had called Marlene in tears (pathetically, as they'd only met a few weeks prior, but Lily had been desperate and utterly friendless, so no amount of shame would have stopped her) and practically begged her to come over and keep her company. It had been an avalanche of terrible things all at once, that week — she'd broken up with her boyfriend (who, honestly, was a twat, but still), her father had fallen ill, _and_ her sister had written ( _fucking written_ ) to say that she was not invited to her upcoming wedding no matter what their mother might have said to the contrary. It had been a hell of a week and Lily had tried to keep it together, but then she was home alone on a Friday night and she'd just collapsed.

She and Marlene had watched _Love Actually,_ Lily'd cried through every plot, and eventually she'd started to feel better. After that, it was just a thing they did — they'd get together at one flat or the other, open a bottle of wine (or gin as required), and eat pizza and popcorn until they couldn't bloody move.

'Oh, sure,' Marlene said, and Lily could hear her start rustling around on the other end, 'even if I _had_ plans, I'd cancel them for that.'

'You just like the thrill you get from cancelling, don't pretend like it has anything to do with me,' Lily said, grinning at their old joke. Since they'd started having these movies nights, Marlene had indeed cancelled a few dates in order to attend them. Lily had tried time and again to tell Marlene that she absolutely did _not_ need to do that, but Marlene was insistent. They were friends and friends came first — her romantic life would be there when she was ready for it.

Marlene laughed. 'I won't pretend that I don't enjoy how enthusiastic people are when you make them wait for it.'

'Ugh, god,' Lily rolled her eyes, 'you're insufferable.'

She could practically hear Marlene's grin over the phone. 'Whatever. Do you want me to come over later or is it alright if I just leave with you now?'

'How do you know I'm leaving now?'

'Don't insult me, Lil.'

Lily laughed. 'Yeah, alright. I'll meet you in your office in a mo.'

'Brill,' Marlene said, and they hung up.

Marlene was locking up when Lily reached her office a few minutes later, her mobile sandwiched between her shoulder and her ear as she nodded along to whatever the person on the other end was saying.

'No, Saturday won't work for me, I'm — yeah, location.' Marlene smiled at Lily as she turned around, mouthed _sorry_ as they started walking down the corridor towards the lifts. Lily shook her head at her, reached into her bag to pull out her own mobile and resume going through emails. She didn't really have much to look at (or, more accurately, much that she felt like looking at), but she didn't want to sit here and just listen in on Marlene either.

'I could do tomorrow, if that's not too short notice? I was _really_ looking forward to tonight, but I really can't get away... Seven is perfect…. Alright, I'll see you then…. Alright, bye.'

Lily stuffed her mobile back into her bag and pressed the button for the lift as Marlene hung up.

'So you _did_ have plans tonight.'

Marlene shot her a grin as they stepped into the lift and pressed the button for the lobby. 'I forgot that I'd agreed to get dinner with Derek tonight,' she said.

Lily furrowed her brow, started running through the list of people she remembered Marlene talking about to try and remember which one Derek was. Marlene, seeing Lily's confusion, clarified. 'That American bloke I met at Waitrose.'

Lily nodded in understanding. 'Ah, yes. Exploded a bag of peas because you're just so gorgeous and he couldn't contain himself.'

Marlene laughed, nodded. 'That's him.'

'Is this your… second date? Third?'

'Third,' Marlene said, grinning. 'He seemed a bit put out that I was rescheduling, but I reckon we'll make up for it tomorrow.'

Lily snorted. 'I really don't understand you and your sex life. It's phenomenal.'

'Weird the things that happen when you put yourself out there, eh, _Evans_?'

Lily groaned and elbowed her in the side as they stepped out into the lobby. They said their goodnights to Stan, walked out onto the pavement, and headed down Cornwall Street towards the underground station.

'I cannot _wait_ to get into the Italian sunshine on Thursday,' Lily said, frowning up at the grey sky. 'It'll actually feel like summer for once.'

'God, I know,' Marlene looped her arm through Lily's. 'I think that this is going to be a great series. The locations alone — '

'James picked most of them! I'm so fucking excited. Even Iceland — I've never been to Iceland before!'

Still a bit paranoid about being overheard, they shifted the focus of their conversation for the rest of the walk to Waterloo station. They talked about some gallery that Marlene had recently visited that Lily apparently needed to see, the delicious bakes Lily'd had at the bakery that opened up on the High Street near her flat last month, and Marlene regaled her with tales about her cats, Keyboard and Wallace, who had discovered that the pot plant Marlene was growing on the back patio was catnip and, thus, safe to eat.

'You should have fucking _seen_ them when I got home two nights ago, Lil,' Marlene said. They were both in tears as they walked down the stairs into the station and Lily was clutching at the handrail so that she didn't trip and crack her head.

'They were screaming at the top of their stupid cat lungs and running around the flat like someone was trying to light their arses on fire. They were going fucking _mad._ And then, just when I started to think they'd settled down, they started back up again! Fucking Keyboard knocked over an entire stack of books off my shelf!'

They scanned their Oysters at the turnstile, made their way through the steadily growing crowd of people towards the Waterloo & City line. It wasn't that late in the afternoon, just gone three, but Lily knew that it was only a matter of time before the station got absolutely out of control. They jogged down the left side of the escalators, sliding past people standing calmly on the right, went left towards their line and started moving swiftly down the tiled tunnel. They arrived on the platform a moment later, the next train due to arrive in a minute, and walked away from the crowd at the tunnel entrance towards what would be the middle of the train when it pulled in.

There were a few seats open throughout the carriage when the train arrived, but, as they were getting off at the next stop, Lily and Marlene opted to stand in the centre of the car. They got off at Bank four minutes later and chatted amicably as they moved through the station towards the eastbound Central Line platform. Lily, used to having to fight through crowds of people to get to her train, quite enjoyed being able to take the walk at a slightly more leisurely pace than she normally would have done. She and Marlene were still sliding past herds of slow walkers clogging up the centre of every fucking walkway, but she wasn't feeling the usual hammering in her chest as she convinced herself again and again that she was missing her train and that the train she'd just heard leave underneath her feet was going to be the last one going in her direction for _at least_ ten minutes.

It never happened that way, but it didn't stop her anxiety from whipping her up about it.

They boarded the eastbound train a few minutes after arriving on the platform, managed to grab a pair of seats at the back of the carriage, and chatted about movie options while they hurtled along towards East London. They'd managed to make a selection by Mile End, and Marlene spent the rest of the trip reminding Lily how absolutely _exhausting_ it was that she had the audacity to live all the way out in Leytonstone.

She was still banging on about it as the climbed down the stairs at the Leytonstone platform.

'God, I didn't think we'd _ever_ get here,' Marlene said, nudging Lily playfully in the ribs as they moved through the turnstiles at the very bottom of the stairs. Leytonstone station was incredibly small, just a few turnstiles on either side of a small ticket booth, an even smaller shop window on the left hand side, but Lily preferred it to the chronically bustling stations in Central London. Say what she would, and Marlene always did, Lily wouldn't have lived anywhere else even if she could have afforded it.

'That joke never gets old, Mar.' Lily rolled her eyes, grabbed a paper from the rack at the bottom of the ramp, and started up towards the street. Even though she'd seen them every day for the past few years, she still let her eyes move slowly over the Hitchcock mosaics that ran the length of the tunnel up to the road. She honestly couldn't have cared less about Hitchcock, but she loved the worn-in look of the tiles, loved that someone had thought to bring colour into what would otherwise be a rather boring walk back up to the street. It was little details like that that made Leytonstone home more than any other part of London could ever be.

Marlene looped her arm through Lily's again, took the newspaper out of Lily's hand, and scanned the headlines before handing it back with a sigh. 'Can you believe this shit?' Marlene asked, shaking her head.

'Nope,' Lily sighed, 'but then again, I absolutely fucking can.'

They walked up Church, turned onto the High Street, and Lily pulled Marlene into the new bakery at the bottom of the hill ('You've got to try this place, Mar, it might be enough to convince you to move out here!') before they started the walk up towards Lily's flat, about halfway up the hill towards the Tesco at the very top. They walked through the door of her building a few minutes later, crumbs already down the front of Lily's shirt because she hadn't been able (or willing) to resist the pastries they'd gotten from the bakery. Marlene grabbed Lily's post off the mat and Lily smiled her thanks as they started up the stairs to her flat.

They dropped their things underneath Lily's coat rack just inside the door, and Lily walked down the corridor into the kitchen.

'What do you want for dinner?' she called. 'We could have stopped and gotten takeaway, now that I'm thinking about it. Or we could make pasta? This was obviously last minute, so I haven't got the usual frozen pizza.'

'Whatever,' Marlene walked into the kitchen, opened up Lily's refrigerator and took a quick inventory. 'You've got pesto. Want to just do that?'

Lily nodded, grabbed a saucepan, and started the pasta boiling. Now that they were back inside and there was no chance of being overheard, their conversation turned back towards the show.

'So James isn't keen on Peter?' Marlene asked, walking over to the pantry and grabbing a bottle of gin and the tonic from the shelf.

Lily groaned. 'Mar, I swear to god, I was going to kill him after that meeting this morning.'

Lily recounted their meeting with Peter and her subsequent argument with James while they waited for the pasta to boil. 'I understand why he was upset,' Lily said, 'but fucking honestly. That was _not_ his place.'

'How did he react to you shouting at him?'

'About as you'd expect, really,' Lily shrugged. 'He wasn't happy about it, but ultimately I think we ended up on the same page.' Marlene hummed thoughtfully, but didn't seem to have anything else to add.

'Speaking of James, though,' Lily dumped the pasta into the strainer as Marlene poured the gin and tonics out into glasses for them. 'What do you think of our lead this year?'

Marlene handed Lily her drink and she smiled appreciatively. 'I like him,' Marlene said, 'like him a lot. He seems genuine, you know? And you obviously like him, so….'

Lily nodded, took a sip of her drink before she turned back to the pasta. 'Yeah, he's a decent bloke.'

'No,' Marlene laughed, 'you _like_ him.'

Lily rolled her eyes at Marlene's emphasis. 'I do not.'

'You absolutely do so.'

'Okay, first of all, we are _not_ in grade nine and I'm not doing this with you. Second of all, it would be incredibly stupid for me to _like him_ as he's coming on our show to find a fucking wife _._ '

Marlene just raised her eyebrows at Lily over the rim of her glass. 'I'm just telling you what I saw.'

'Well, what you saw was utter nonsense. We work together and we get on. That doesn't mean I want to fuck him or whatever you're insinuating.

'You know exactly what I'm insinuating.'

'I know that I hate you.'

'Liar.'

Lily took another long pull from her gin and tonic. 'Is he fit?' she asked, turning her gaze back to the pasta as she started heaping in pesto, 'Yeah. But that's about it.'

'Mmhmm.' Marlene didn't even try to hide her smile. Lily grabbed the bowl of pasta and a pair of forks from the counter and stalked off into the living room, Marlene's laughter trailing behind her.


	9. Chapter 8

**happy birthday sweetlittledrama! I know it isn't ch39 (well, with edits, I guess it would be ch38 now), but hopefully it'll do xx**

* * *

The rest of the week flew by so quickly that, looking back, Lily would have sworn that it never happened at all. Before she knew it, it was late Wednesday night (far later than was advisable) and she was packing her bags for the next few weeks. They were starting filming in Rome before heading to Greece and, in the third week, Inverness, and though Lily thought that she _might_ be able to get away with packing for the Mediterranean and swinging home before heading up to Scotland, she also knew that it would have been incredibly stupid to think anything of the sort. She'd been looking obsessively at the schedules she and Mary had drawn up for the duration of filming, and she knew that she was just going to be laundering the same clothes over and over for the next six weeks.

Trouble was, of course, that while she could get away with shorts, sundresses, and t shirts for most of the locations, she'd need jeans and at least two emergency jumpers for the others, even a fucking _coat_ for Iceland. Still, she jammed what she could into her largest case, packed away everything else in her carry on, and found herself clunking down the stairs far too early on Thursday morning to meet the studio car on the way to pick up James in Central London.

She tossed her bags into the boot and slid into the back seat, tried to enjoy the last few minutes of quiet before she was thrust into the absolute madness that was filming. She and James were going to be practically glued at the hip for the next two months, and though she was sure that they were going to get on just fine, she still wanted to take this time to enjoy her last few moments of alone time.

Though she would probably never admit it, Lily had been turning over Marlene's comment since their movie night on Monday. She'd largely let herself forget about it during the movie, mostly because she was far too distracted laughing at John Cleese than to even begin to think about anything else, but when Marlene had left that night and she'd stood in the kitchen tidying up, alcohol buzzing through her veins, she had let herself think about it a little bit. Marlene probably hadn't meant anything by it, had dropped it into conversation to tease her about her obvious type (James, it was true, was just a better looking version of the last few men she'd dated), maybe, _at most,_ Marlenehad brought it up to point out that Lily needed to be careful about drawing boundaries because she knew that Lily was the type to let herself fall into a situation where lines were blurred and trouble ensued.

Whatever Marlene's intention, because Lily couldn't let herself accept that Marlene had been making a genuine observation based on her interaction with James that afternoon, Lily wasn't quite sure what to make of it. She'd scrubbed every inch of her flat, re-organised her books and DVDs, went on more walks around her neighbourhood that she had since bloody moving in, but no matter what she found to do, she couldn't keep her mind off of it (or James) for longer than a few minutes.

That was probably exactly what Marlene wanted.

James looked exhausted when he walked out of his flat a half an hour later, didn't say anything to her when he climbed into the back of the car, just curled up in the corner and fell back asleep for the rest of the ride to Heathrow. While she might have been tempted to tease him, they _did_ still have an hour and a half until the bloody sun was even up, so she figured that, this time at least, his exhaustion was justified and she should leave him well enough alone.

She told herself that the fact that her gaze kept drifting over to him had nothing to do with the argument she'd been running through in her head all weekend.

They moved in relative silence once they got to the airport, only speaking when absolutely necessary. James was still yawning and scrubbing at his eyes as they moved through the queue at security, and Lily watched as he checked and re-checked his pockets to make sure that he hadn't dropped or otherwise lost his travel documents since the last time he'd had them in his hands. She caught herself smiling at him for being so bloody endearing, did her best to rearrange her features whenever he looked over at her, but he caught her the last time, the corners of her mouth still twitching with a bit of a smile, and he raised an eyebrow at her before quickly reaching up and covering a yawn with the back of his hand.

'What are you smiling about, Evans?'

She could have lied, but it seemed like a weird thing to lie about. She could smile at him. What was wrong with smiling at him?

'You keep checking for your passport and stuff like you think you're going to lose it. Like every five minutes your hands are in your pockets again.'

He frowned. 'That's funny to you?'

She shrugged. 'It's cute.'

He smirked at her, the left side of his mouth hitching up just a bit, before he lost it to another yawn.

She spent the rest of their time in line forgetting how adorable it was.

They eventually made their way out of security, started moving slowly through the surprisingly large group of people trying to go into the WH Smith just across the way, and headed downstairs so that they were closer to their gate. They still had an hour before their flight was due to take off, and other than grabbing another cup of tea and something to eat, Lily wasn't interested in anything other than settling in a chair at their gate and closing her eyes until boarding started. They walked past another WH Smith, past a row of designer shops before Lily finally spotted the Pret on the other side of the terminal. She groaned audibly in relief and, even though she noticed James shoot her an amused look from the corner of her eye, Lily doubled her pace, leaving James well behind her, and planted herself at the back of the short queue while she tried to decide what she wanted.

'What are you going to get?'

She jumped, spun around, and swatted James' arm before she could stop herself. 'Fuck,' she snapped, 'don't sneak up on me like that!'

James laughed. 'Sorry.'

She rolled her eyes at him before she turned back to continue reading the menu board. 'No you're not.'

She saw James shoot her a grin out of the corner of her eye, but she was not going to give him the satisfaction of knowing that she saw it.

Lily was still frowning up at the board when it was their turn, but, desperate to avoid being that dick that held up the line, she finally just picked something and smiled at the woman behind the counter.

'Hi, I'd like a bacon brioche, an apple, and a breakfast tea. And whatever he's having.'

She stepped aside to make room for James, waiting for him to start grumbling about how he could pay for his own damn food, but, mercifully, James was either too tired to start whinging or he knew that she was absolutely not in the mood for it.

'Hi.' He shot the woman behind the counter a winning smile. 'I'll also have a bacon brioche and a breakfast tea. And…' he scanned the menu one more time, 'a mango and lime and an almond croissant.'

The cashier nodded and Lily handed her her card before they stepped off to the side to wait for their order.

'I'm surprised you didn't get the posh fruit pot,' Lily said, smirking at him.

James nudged her with his elbow. 'Oh, piss off, Evans.'

Lily just laughed.

Once their order was ready, they collected their food, careful to stuff the bags under their arms open side up so that they didn't drop everything onto the floor, and headed towards their gate. They were fairly early, having anticipated a much longer wait in security than they'd ended up having to suffer through, but there were still only a few remaining seats outside A1.

Lily slowed as they approached their gate, frowning as she scanned the seating area to try and find some place relatively separated from the rest of the crowd where she and James could sit and talk without having to worry about being interrupted or overheard. After a moment, she spotted a cluster of free seats over near the window, and nudged James, nodded towards the seats before she set off through the crowd.

Lily dropped her case onto the ground when they reached their seats, set her sandwich bag in her lap, and took a long drink of her tea as James settled into the seat beside her. They ate quietly for a few minutes, the crinkling of their parchment sandwich bags and the hum of the airport filling the space between them.

James leaned back in his chair a few minutes later, sighed through a sip of tea, and turned to look at her. 'Lots of people going to Rome, eh?'

She shrugged. 'Apparently. I didn't think it would be this busy, but I don't know.'

'Summer holidays,' James said. He took another bite of his sandwich, waited for Lily to say something. Lily shrugged.

James sat up a bit straighter in his chair and frowned at her. 'You alright?'

She sighed. 'Yeah, James. I'm fine.'

'What's with the face then?'

'What face?'

He pointed at her with the hand holding his tea. 'That face.'

She sighed, tucked a piece of hair back behind her ear. 'I'm just running through the schedule for today, that's all.'

'We're not even in Rome yet,' he said. 'You don't need to stress out about this yet.'

'I know, but — '

'Evans,' he leaned a little closer to her. 'It's going to be fine. I actually read the email you sent me this time.'

She breathed a laugh. 'Thank fuck for that.'

James grinned, nudged his knee with hers. 'See? I'm not as useless as I seem.'

She rolled her eyes. 'No one said you were useless, James.'

They fell quiet again, but the silence was softer this time, easier, and Lily felt herself settle more comfortably into her seat as she leaned back and watched the aeroplanes taxi outside the window.

'Play a game with me.'

James was popping the lid off his container of fruit when she turned to look at him. 'What kind of game?'

'Question game,' he said, spearing a piece of mango. 'Nothing too involved.'

She hummed as she considered him, bit back a smile at the innocent look on his face. Finally she shrugged, leaned back in her chair again, and took a bite of her apple.

'Alright. Go ahead.'

'You're going to let me go first?'

She shrugged. James grinned. 'Let's start easy. What's the best part of your hometown?'

'Oh, huh.' She bit her lip, took a thoughtful sip of tea.

'Okay,' she turned a bit in her seat to face him, 'so, we didn't live in the best part of Liverpool growing up — '

James quirked an amused eyebrow at her. 'Is there a best part?'

She nudged him hard in the ribs. 'Fuck you! Yes there is a best part, I just didn't happen to live in it. I liked to get on the bus after school and head over to the river and just walk around until the sun started to go down.'

'Why?'

She shrugged. 'I just always liked how much busier it was, how loud it was. I also liked walking around and looking for things I'd seen in movies and telly and stuff. You know they film a lot in Liverpool?'

'I didn't know that, no.'

'Oh,' Lily shot him a grin. 'Well now you do.'

James smiled at her. 'Now it's your turn to ask a question.'

'What's your favourite place at home?'

James groaned. 'You can't just ask me the same question, Evans.'

'Why not?!'

'Because then we don't get — I don't know! Fewer questions is less fun! I want to know what you want to know about me not what I want to know about you.'

'How about we both answer the question and we still switch off asking?'

James sighed far more dramatically than was strictly necessary, but agreed all the same.

'Sirius and I always thought it was quite funny to try and sneak into the golf clubs around our house,' James said. 'I don't know why, because we never wanted to go when Mum made us, but sneaking into ones we didn't belong to always held some really weird appeal.'

They spent the next hour at their gate eating breakfast and shooting questions back and forth about various topics (music and television and ridiculous childhood antics dominated the conversation). When boarding finally started, the sun just peeking up over the horizon, Lily was finally ready for their journey to begin.

When Lily had travelled with the contestants last year, her travel experiences had happened in a packed coach cabin with six women to her charge and, thus, rarely a single moment of peace. Travelling with James, Lily was pleased to find out, was a different situation entirely. James, as the star of the show, was afforded first class travel accommodations, and, as his producer, Lily was strongly encouraged to book herself seats right alongside him.

As though she'd need to be asked twice.

They gathered up their bags and queued with the other priority boarding passengers, silence falling between them as they waited to have their tickets scanned and started down the tunnel towards the plane. She expected James to pick up the conversation once they got to their seats, the largest, most comfortable looking seats Lily had ever seen, but James just stowed his carry-on in the compartment overhead, asked Lily if she wanted the window or the aisle, and settled into his seat without saying much else.

'You alright?' She turned a bit in her seat to face him and James' eyes snapped to hers. He nodded. 'Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine.'

'You don't look fine.'

James sighed softly. 'Just a bit nervous is all.'

'The flying?'

He shook his head, let his eyes move over the people milling around the plane behind them before he found her gaze again. 'The whole "meeting twenty five women tonight" thing.'

'Oh,' Lily laughed quietly, nudged him lightly with her elbow in an attempt to lighten him up. 'Come on, you can't honestly be worried about that.'

James frowned. 'Can't I?'

'I mean, I suppose you can be, but you're going to be fine. And I'm going to be there for you every step of the way.'

James' frown deepened and Lily noticed, now, the anxiety on his face. 'What if I forget their names?' he asked. 'Or where they're from? Or — '

'James.' Lily held up her hand and James fell immediately silent. She softened her tone as she continued. 'You will forget that stuff. You'll be meeting twenty five people really, really quickly. But it's my job to remember everyone for you and to pass you that information as you need it. I'm not going to let you fall on your face, okay?'

James studied her for a moment and, after a long, deep breath, nodded.

She gave him what she hoped was a warm, encouraging smile before she patted his knee and pulled her mobile out of her trouser pocket to flick through her emails one last time before takeoff.


	10. Chapter 9

**another early chapter because I'm busy and I know I'll forget otherwise**

 **happy Sunday my friends x**

* * *

Whatever nerves James had been feeling when they'd gotten on the plane in London seemed to, thankfully, have seeped out of him somewhere over Europe. When they touched down in Rome two and a half hours later, he was back to his bright, energetic self, and was practically skipping through the airport as Lily jogged along in his wake.

'James,' she snapped as they made their way into the immigration queue, 'you've got to slow down, I'm not as tall as you are!'

James tried to look contrite, but the wide smile on his face significantly hampered the effect. 'Sorry,' he said, now bouncing on the balls of his feet. 'I'm just excited. I was nervous before but now that we're here — I'm just ready to get going, you know?'

'Yeah, James,' she said, rolling her eyes and biting back a smile, 'I know.'

They made their way a bit more quickly through the border control line than Lily anticipated they would have, and so, after grabbing their things at the baggage reclaim, they still had a little over half an hour before the car was scheduled to pick them up.

Lily turned to James as he grabbed the last bag off the luggage carousel. 'Do you want to wait in here or wait outside?'

James positively beamed. 'Outside.'

It was much hotter outside than Lily was used to, accustomed, as she was, to grey, barely there English summers, but she relished the feeling of the sun on her skin and the warmth in her hair, and so she didn't mind the thin sheen of sweat that developed on her brow as they stood and waited for the car. If Lily was enjoying the sun, though, James was brought to life by it — his smile seemed wider, his laugh louder. It was like the sun multiplied every positive thing about him until there was so much of it that he was bursting at the seams.

'You really like it here, don't you?' Lily asked, shading her eyes as she watched James bounce up and down on the balls of his feet.

'I just _love_ summer,' James said. 'It's so warm and bright and just — ugh, it makes me want to go run around on the pitch.'

He had such a wistful look in his eyes as he said it, but there was also a trace of hurt there. He swung his arms into a quick stretch and Lily bit back a laugh.

'Well, unfortunately, we don't have football on our schedule.'

'Surely we could rearrange it.'

'No we absolutely cannot,' she said, shooting him a look that she hoped would tame the rebellious look now shining in his eyes. 'And don't call me Shirley.'

James burst out laughing. 'Fuck Evans, I haven't seen that movie in years!'

Lily grinned. 'We'll have to find it for you at some point — you can watch it on your downtime.'

'How am I going to do that without my phone?'

Ah, so he was still bitter about that. 'First of all, every room that you're going to be staying in is going to have these crazy things, I don't know if you've heard of them, but they're called televisions — '

'Oh ha ha.'

' — and second of all,' Lily continued, determined to ignore the interruption, 'you agreed to give up your phone, so I don't know why you're still complaining about it.'

James sighed and Lily hoped that he would really just give it up this time. They'd had more arguments about his damn mobile in the past week than Lily could stand, and she knew that James knew just how tired she was of talking about it. The thing about James, though, was that he didn't much care if she was tired of talking about it if he thought it was something they needed to talk about.

She both admired and was irritated by his persistence.

'I'm guessing you don't want to hear this argument I crafted about my Snap Streaks?' he asked, raising an eyebrow at her. There was a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth and _god_ she wanted to smack him for having fun at her expense.

'No James,' she said, rolling her eyes at him, 'I absolutely could not care less about your Snap Streaks.'

Argument successfully averted, they settled into fairly easy conversation while they stood there on the pavement. The sun eventually got to be a bit much (rather, James noticed that Lily's cheeks and arms were starting to turn a bit pink and, laughing so much that Lily elbowed him, asked if they wanted to move out of the sun so her "little fair-skinned self" didn't get a sunburn) and they moved under an awning near a giant metal statue of something that neither of them could really identify. James still wandered about as they waited, occasionally dipping into the sun and beaming at her "from the other side" and though she told him to shut up, she couldn't help but admire the way that the bright sun made his jet black hair shine, the way it almost looked iridescent in the light.

After a while, Lily's mobile began vibrating in her hand — she tapped her screen to accept the call and pressed the phone to her ear.

'Evans — Yes, terminal three. Just beside that brown metal statue — yeah, that one. Alright, see you in five.'

She clicked her mobile off, stuffed if back into her trouser pocket, and adjusted the bag on her shoulder as she turned to James. 'The car will be here in five. Benjy Fenwick, our assigned cameraman, is going to be in the car when we get there. He'll switch the camera on once we're settled, so anything that you want to say or do that you _definitely_ don't want on camera, you might want to do that now.'

James quirked an eyebrow at her. 'What do you think that I'm going to want to do exactly?'

She shrugged. 'You never know. I'm just saying, this is the last free time you're going to get outside of your room for the next seven weeks, so you might want to use it to your advantage.'

'Why's he going to be filming while we're in the car and shit? That can't be that exciting.'

Lily brushed a piece of hair out of her eyes, squinted into the sun as she scanned the cars crawling past them for the black town car they were expecting. 'It isn't, but Peter is of the opinion that you never know when someone is going to do or say something interesting. The American production crew actually puts cameras in their contestants bedrooms, though, so it could definitely be worse.'

'Fuck,' James pushed his glasses back up his nose, 'thank god I'm not in America.'

Lily shot him a grin. 'For this reason and so many others.'

James laughed. 'Damn right, Evans.'

Their car pulled up a moment later and they walked quickly through the crowd on the pavement. The driver opened the boot as they approached and they dumped their bags in before shutting the doors and sliding into the back.

'Lil!'

Lily grinned at the man in the corner of the car, leaned over and carefully pressed a kiss to his cheek (and doing her best to keep from knocking the camera). 'Fen! How're you doing?'

Lily settled her seat opposite Benjy, smiled encouragingly at James as he settled into the seat beside her.

'Doing wonderful as always,' Benjy said, a wide smile on his face. 'Got to Italy yesterday with the rest of the crew and we had nothing to do, so Peter let us muck around a bit.'

Lily raised an eyebrow at him, a smirk tugging at her lips. 'Did he now?'

'Well, no,' Benjy grinned, 'but we got our work done, so what Peter doesn't know won't hurt him.' Lily laughed and Benjy turned towards James as he leaned over and held his hand out for James to shake.

'Mr Potter,' Benjy said, shaking James' hand. 'I'm Benjy Fenwick, your camera for the next seven weeks. It's lovely to meet you.'

'Just James, Benjy, please,' James said, 'It's great to meet you, too, mate. Evans said that you're going to be filming everything I do for the next two months?'

'That I am,' Benjy nodded, 'so if you've got any last things you'd like to get out before I flick this switch, I'd do it now.'

James shot Lily a quick, amused look before he turned back to Benjy. 'I think I'm good, mate. Go ahead.'

And with one final nod from Benjy, the red light on the front of the camera clicked on.


	11. Chapter 10

**You get another chapter early because I have to go to Ikea again.**

 **You're lucky I remembered, because I was in the car ready to roll and then I was like _fuck._**

 **Also I really hope I didn't make any typos because I didn't read this for the usual third time before I hit publish today**

* * *

They chatted easily as the car left the airport and merged onto A91 — about the house they were headed to in central Rome, their plans for the next few days, what James could expect when they got to the set. Benjy pulled a micpack out from the holdall beside him and handed it it James, who looked at it with a slightly puzzled expression on his face before Lily explained how to go about attaching it to himself.

'Here,' she leaned over and grabbed the pieces out of his hands. 'This,' she held up the small microphone, 'is your lav. We'll tape — Benjy, have you got — Ah, thanks — okay, we'll tape this, probably to your chest, what do you think, Fen?' Benjy nodded and Lily hummed her agreement. 'We'll tape this to your chest and hook the wire into the mic pack on your back. It's got a clip,' she demonstrated, 'so you can just attach it to the back of whatever trousers you're wearing pretty easily.'

'It'll feel weird at first,' she said, and she handed James the microphone which he took far more gingerly than necessary, 'but you'll get used to it.'

'It's a fairly quick turn around here,' Lily said as James clipped the micpack onto the back of his jeans, 'so don't expect to get _too_ cosy while we're here. We've got the rest of the day today, and then we'll be filming all night tomorrow night before we leave.'

'Is there going to be any time to do anything else while were here?' James asked. 'Maybe wander around the city or?'

Lily shook her head. 'I don't reckon there will be. We've got a lot of interviews and shots to get today and tomorrow.'

'Yeah, James,' Benjy said, grinning at James from behind the camera, 'we're going to be really busy.'

He winked and Lily kicked his foot from across the car. 'Don't you start.'

Benjy just smiled easily at her and Lily sighed. 'I forgot how much of an enabler you are, Fen.'

'Me?' Benjy let his jaw drop dramatically, 'I can't believe you would say something like that to me, Lil. _Especially_ since you requested to work with me this year.'

Lily rolled her eyes. 'Oh, shut up.'

Benjy laughed and nudged his foot playfully against hers.

They had been making decent progress on the motorway, but when they turned off A91 onto Via Cristoforo Colombo, the traffic slowed significantly. James turned in his seat and looked out the window as they drove along, and, after a bit of badgering, consented to talk to Lily about how excited he was to be in Rome so that they could get some audio.

'They might not want to use the actual footage because you're,' she gestured at his clothes, 'but we can at least get a decent voiceover.'

'Excuse me,' James frowned at her, 'I look great right now.'

'Yeah, yeah,' she rolled her eyes, 'you're gorgeous.'

It was a little over an hour before they turned onto Via Piemonte and stopped in front of the villa they were renting for the next few days, and though Lily was inclined to be frustrated (they were supposed to have been here a half an hour ago), she couldn't bring herself to mind _too_ much when she considered the audio that they'd captured on the way. James and Lily climbed out of the car, their legs still a bit shaky from lack of use, and grabbed their bags from the boot while Benjy clambered out behind them.

Lily was careful to walk back beside Benjy, something that had initially thrown James before she explained (again) that this was how things were going to be whenever the camera was on him, as they headed towards the house. Benjy got some decent footage of James walking up the stairs into the villa, one bag hitched lightly over his shoulder, his other case in his hand, and she could practically hear the voiceover from the car that they would play over this moment when they aired the show. The scene was going to be phenomenal — the bright Italian sun shining overhead, James' voice, glowing with excitement as they'd talked about the cocktail party coming up the next night, and then, _then_ , that completely improvised (and totally cheeky) smile that James gave the camera as he reached the front door. It was perfect. Absolutely fucking perfect.

Then they opened the door.

The house was, as Lily knew it would be, a flurry of activity. From where she and Benjy were standing, you could just see the wide, sweeping staircase just inside the door, the high ceilings, the rich, honey-coloured walls, but a simple glance to either side revealed a completely different story than the one currently being recorded on Benjy's camera. The crew had arrived a few days before they had, and the house, beautiful down the centre of the hallway and from certain angles, was covered in more equipment than most people had ever seen in their lives. There were people pressed all along the walls as they slid past, trying their best to stay out of the shot as they scuttled off to the room where they'd set up production.

James hesitated on the threshold for a moment before he straightened just a touch and stepped into the fray.

Lily had coached him in the car, walked him through each step of what they wanted him to do as they walked in through the door, and she was pleased to see that, despite his brief hesitation at the door, James remembered what they'd talked about before they'd gotten to the house. He paused for a moment in the entry, looked around with something of an awed expression on his face, before he moved forward up the stairs, hitching his bag more securely onto his shoulder. Lily and Benjy followed him the whole way, Lily walking silently behind until they got to the top of the stairs and James turned to her.

'I can — ' he hesitated like he thought she might snap at him for talking to her while the camera was on. She grinned. 'We'll edit all this out. What do you need?'

'Where's my room?'

Lily pointed down the corridor in front of them. 'Second on the left.'

'Aren't I the only one staying here,' James asked as he continued down the corridor into his room. 'Why did they get such a huge fucking place? Oh, sh — crap?'

He shot Benjy an apologetic look, but Benjy was clearly biting back what was, at the very least, a smile. Benjy's hands occupied as they were, Lily waved James' concerns off. 'James, it's fine. We're going to edit 90% of this out. Honestly.'

James visibly relaxed and Lily resisted the urge to reach out and comfort him. Every ounce of excitement (and most of his confidence) seemed to have leached out of him on the drive from the airport, and it had happened without her even noticing. He still, outwardly, looked calm, still looked confident — the way he carried himself, shoulders down and back, head held high certainly helped with that impression — but he was radically different from the bright, energetic James she usually worked with, the one that had been practically skipping circles around her in the sun outside the airport. She hadn't expected that he would be this nervous once the cameras were turned on, especially with his off-camera personality being what it was, but then again, his job (his _old_ job) hadn't exactly trained him for up-close-and-personal camera work. She knew that it would just take some time for him to warm up and get used to having the camera on him all the time, but she didn't want him to have to be massively uncomfortable in the interim.

Lily left James to unpack his things and, after asking Benjy where to go, walked back into the corridor and started towards the room production had chosen as their homebase. She was sure that they all knew that James was now on set, but she figured that it would be nice if she at least made an effort to go and tell someone.

She also should probably get herself a radio (no matter how little she actually wanted that fucking radio) and maybe go to that "meeting" she had on her schedule. She always hoped that leaving London meant leaving meetings behind, but she was always, _always_ disappointed.

She really should know better by now, but some dreams die hard.

She rapped on the door as she pushed it open, and tried not to jump in surprise when she realised how packed the room was. She knew there were a few dozen producers, but back in their enormous studio conference rooms, it never felt like this many. Cramming them into a small bedroom, though, really highlighted just how large the staff really was.

Cara, one of the producers that worked with Lily on the contestant side last year, smiled when Lily walked in. She was easily one of the sweetest people Lily had ever met — most of the time. It was what made her work on the contestant side as flawless as it had been last year — she'd reel contestants in with her winning personality and people would tell her anything she asked.

And when they didn't, she could crack like a fucking whip.

'How are you doing, Lily? How was the flight in?' Cara smiled warmly and slid over a bit on the small sofa production must have moved into the bedroom they were set up in and patted the seat next to her.

Lily shrugged good naturedly as she slid into the space beside Cara. 'Flight was great — bit of traffic on the drive in, but nothing too outrageous.'

'Have you got your radio yet?' Cara leaned back and ran her eyes over Lily looking for evidence of wires. Lily shook her head.

Cara sighed and turned back to the room at large. 'Someone get me a radio for Lily! Who was supposed to go run this to her when she got here?!'

Mary, Lily's assistant, slid out of a far corner, extra radio in hand. 'I was supposed to — '

'Ah, Mary, thanks,' Lily said, smiling warmly and cutting Mary off. 'Sorry I brushed you off when we first got here, we were just in the middle of a great shot and I didn't want to walk in front of it. Sorry I didn't come find you sooner, but you know,' Lily grinned, amused, as she hooked the radio to the back of her jeans and started feeding the headset wires up through the back of her shirt, 'I didn't want to wear this thing any longer than necessary.'

Mary shot Lily a grateful smile and Lily noticed Cara relax a bit in her seat in her periphery.

'How was your trip in Mary? Cara?' Lily leaned back in her seat so that she could see both of them more clearly.

'My trip was great,' Cara said, her warm smile and easy tone now firmly back in place. 'I only ever wish that we would have time to explore the city a bit! I've never been to Rome before.'

'I haven't either,' Mary said as she settled onto the arm of the sofa next to Lily. 'If the drive in was anything to go on, though, it looks bloody beautiful.'

Lily laughed. 'I'm glad you enjoyed the drive because that's about all that you're going to get. The drive in and the drive out.'

Mary had just opened her mouth to respond when Peter, who Lily had pretended not to see sitting along the opposite wall, stood and clapped his hands together. Everyone in the room immediately fell silent and the look of satisfaction on Peter's face was enough to make her want to vomit into her hands.

Cara, apparently, felt the same way, because she leaned over and gagged quietly in Lily's ear.

'Benvenuto!' Peter Anglicised the word to such a degree that Lily was surprised she was able to even recognise what he was actually trying to say. 'Welcome to beautiful Roma!'

This time he gestured wildly with his hands in what he, evidently, thought was a charming representation of what he thought Italian people were like.

Lily did her best to ignore the pressing urge to hit him.

'Now that Lily is finally here,' Peter shot her a look and Cara shifted closer to Lily, careful to nudge her elbow lightly against hers in a show of quiet solidarity, 'we know that our leading man is officially in the house! How was he on the way in this morning, kid?'

Lily cleared her throat, tried to inject cold steel into the look she gave Peter. 'Trip in was great. We got some audio in the car and some truly brilliant shots on the way into the house. Benjy is already out-doing himself.'

'Great,' Peter's tone was clipped and he waved a dismissive hand. Lily pressed her lips together.

Peter turned to look at Cara and the other producers responsible for the contestants, his eyes moving slowly between each of them as though he were trying to decide which one to target. Evidently, he decided on Cara, because he turned his gaze back to her when he'd finished making the rounds, a slight furrow between his brows. 'And when are your girls going to be here? They're all in Rome, correct?'

God, these meetings could be so much fucking shorter and far more infrequent if Peter ever actually paid attention to the emails they sent him or the plans they made in the production meetings back in London.

'All the _contestants_ landed yesterday,' Cara said, and the way that she subtly emphasised the word didn't escape anyone's notice (except, perhaps, Peter's). 'My group have been informed of the schedule for tomorrow, and I'm sure that's the same for all of us.' She turned and looked at her colleagues who all nodded in turn.

'Mine are under orders to be ready and dressed by eight,' Kate, another producer, said, 'about forty minutes before sunset. That should give us — '

Peter held up a hand and cut her off. 'Are you sure that's enough time? I'd think we need an hour at least.'

Marc, the producer Peter had hired to replace Lily on the contestant side, smiled easily at Peter. 'Mine have the same schedule, Peter. I think it'll be alright.'

Peter nodded, 'Well, alright then,' and changed the subject.

Cara heaved out a sharp, angry sigh and Lily turned her head just enough to catch Cara's eye. They looked away quickly, but the brief glance had been enough.

The rest of the meeting was just as infuriating as Lily had expected it would be, though Lily did start to feel a bit better when Marlene wandered in about halfway through and settled herself on the floor at Lily's feet. She'd nudged Lily as she plopped down and said, 'Hey, love! How was your flight,' in a completely normal tone of voice, despite the fact that Peter was in the middle of what could only be described as a tirade about how often he expected to "get the girls in bikinis this series now that we're going to all these tropical places."

They weren't even going anywhere tropical this year, fucking ignorant twat.

Marlene's interruption had been exactly what Lily needed, both because she relished the look on Peter's face as he tried to bite back the angry retort he undoubtedly wanted to shoot at Marlene for daring to interrupt him, and because, while she loved Cara and some of the other producers, Marlene was really the only one that she wanted to hang out with when they were on set.

Despite the fact that they had talked about the schedule for the next two days at _length_ before they'd even left London, Peter seemed adamant that they all go through every single detail of the schedule again before they were allowed to get up and go back to the jobs they were supposed to be doing. It would have been fine — irritating, but fine — if he'd limited it to a quick overview of what everyone was going to be doing, but he was going around to everyone in turn and asking them to go through the next day and half in excruciating detail. Marlene, apparently deciding that she'd had enough about halfway through the proceedings, pushed herself to her feet just as Peter asked Kate to explain, _again_ , the plan for her contestants for the next thirty six hours. Peter gave Marlene a confused look as she stood, but she smiled warmly at him, and Lily couldn't help but awe at the grace Marlene managed to inject into every situation (even when — no, especially when, that situation was a giant fuck you to the only other member of the production team on her level).

'Well, thanks, Peter,' she said. She rolled her shoulders down her back and pulled herself up just a bit taller. 'I think we've got the plan down for this week.' She turned and smiled at the room. 'Have a great night, everyone. Get some rest, busy day tomorrow!'

Everyone was still for a moment, clearly unsure as to whether or not they were actually being dismissed. Lily, unwilling to sit in Peter's presence any longer than necessary, hopped to her feet and smiled widely at Marlene. She was sure that Peter, if he was looking at her, recognised the amused look on Lily's face, but Lily honestly couldn't be arsed to try and pretend that she wasn't having fun at his expense.

'Thanks, Mar,' Lily reached out and patted Marlene on the elbow. 'Mary, want to come with me? We've got a few things to finish up before we head out for the night.'

Mary shot one nervous look at Peter and then Marlene before she nodded silently and followed Lily out of the room.


	12. Chapter 11

**I'm hardcore procrastinating starting my NaNo project today.**

 **Someone tell me to go work.**

* * *

Lily and Mary spent the rest of the evening with James and Benjy in James' room, first getting some shots of James unpacking his things, then sitting him down in the corner of his room and filming James' first diary of the series.

James had laughed through most of it about how awkward it was to talk to the camera like that, but Lily assured him that it would get easier as time went on. James looked at her like he didn't even remotely believe that, but he at least put in an effort.

Despite how exhausted Lily was when they finally called it, it wasn't late when they packed up for the night. Benjy laughed about how this was the earliest night that James was probably going to get for the next few weeks and suggested that he "live it up". James had just yawned and said that he was going to go to bed, that living it up was going to have to wait for another day.

She'd asked Mary, when they separated that night, to come by round noon, but Lily still found herself walking out of her hotel and across the street towards the house before eight the next morning. Benjy was already there when Lily arrived, camera rolling away as he and James chatted amicably about football (or whatever it was that involved side tackles — that was football, right?) while James ate breakfast. James seemed to have loosened up a bit since they'd arrived — he wasn't shooting them nervous looks whenever he talked about non-show related things while the camera was on, his shoulders were a bit more relaxed, and his smile came easier.

He was almost off-camera James. Almost.

'You've got your mic on, right?' Lily asked as she settled into the seat opposite James at the table. James pulled the collar of his t-shirt down, revealing the small microphone taped to his chest, just about where it had been yesterday.

'Is that placement alright for you?' Lily asked. 'We could — '

'No, it's alright,' James said. 'The tape's going to take some getting used to no matter where you put the damn thing. And I haven't really got chest hair up here, so it seems like my best bet.'

Lily shrugged, reached over and grabbed a piece of toast off of his plate. 'Yeah, I guess that's true.'

'Can I get you a piece of toast, Evans?' James asked, raising an eyebrow at her as she took a bite of the piece she'd swiped.

'I'm good with this one,' Lily said, grinning. 'Thanks, though.'

James snatched the piece of toast back out of Lily's hand and Lily laughed as she got to her feet and crossed the kitchen to make herself a bit of food.

'What are you doing here this early? I don't have anything on the schedule until this afternoon.' James' eyes suddenly widened — 'Right?! I'm not forgetting something, right?'

Lily dropped two pieces of toast into the toaster on the worktop and set the old stovetop kettle onto the flame. 'No,' she said, rummaging around in cupboards to find herself a mug. 'No, you're not. I've just got to be here to make sure you don't run away or something.'

'Do people _usually_ run away?'

'Well, no,' Lily leaned back up against the counter and feigned seriousness. 'But then, we're only on the second series of this show, so we don't have a lot of data to work with.'

James shook his head at her. 'You're ridiculous.'

Lily prepared her tea, grabbed her toast from the toaster, and sat back down across from James. She held one of her pieces of toast out to Benjy, but he shook his head. 'Ate when I got here an hour ago,' he said, smiling at her, 'but thanks, love.'

Lily shrugged and took the largest bite of her toast she could manage.

The three of them chatted easily while James and Lily ate, about what he could expect that night when filming started, all the places they'd go in Rome if they'd been allowed to do such things. James, apparently, was not at all inclined to believe her when she told him that they really weren't allowed to go wandering around Rome all day despite the fact that they had absolutely nothing else to do.

'It just doesn't make any sense,' he said, leaning back in his chair and taking a sip of his tea. 'Why would they bring us all the way here if we weren't going to enjoy it?'

'We both know the answer to that question, James,' she said, rolling her eyes at him. 'And stop fidgeting with your mic, please. You're recording a bunch of fabric rustling and you're going to drive the sound guys out of their heads.'

His hand stilled on his chest as he looked up at her and then immediately fell into his lap. 'Sorry,' he said. 'It just feels weird and I can't help it.'

'Please at least _try_ to help it.'

James grinned at her. 'No promises.'

Lily took a sip of her tea to cover the annoyed (and slightly amused) sigh that escaped.

Lily hadn't realised, being on the contestant side last year, just how calm the first day and a half really was for most everyone else. They still had Benjy following James around with the camera and she still had to make sure that they got some diary time in and shots they could use as filler if necessary, but managing James' schedule before the contestants were thrown into the mix was surprisingly easy. She knew that it wasn't going to be like this for long, though, and she tried to enjoy the relative quiet of her job as much as possible, to store a small reserve of it so that she could lean on it when things got exceptionally busy once the contestants arrived later that night.

She even, much to James' delight, talked Benjy into going on a brief walk around the neighbourhood with James to get some filler shots.

'But Lily,' Benjy said, 'we haven't got permits for that. We've got exterior permits for the house and that's it.'

'Come on, Fen,' Lily smiled at him, 'these could be really great shots. And we've got nothing else to do, right? We'll just walk around for a little while and get some location stuff.'

'Pettigrew is going to be really annoyed when he sees it on the reel.'

Lily barely caught herself before she said, "All the more reason to do it."

'I'll take the fall,' she said instead. 'You know that I'm not going to talk you into something and then let you get in trouble for it. Remember last year?'

Benjy sighed. 'Yes, Lily, I remember last year.'

'Then come _on,_ you know you can trust me.'

After a long moment of deliberation, Benjy sighed again and adjusted his camera. 'Fine. But I swear, if I hear a single thing about this from Pettigrew — '

'I'll throw myself into that fire before it even gets to you, Fen, I swear,' Lily said, grinning at him. She grabbed James by the elbows. 'Ready to go have fun?'

James nodded and Lily beamed as she spun him around and plugged his microphone back in.

The activity in the house started to pick up around six that evening, when the slight darkening of the sky reminded everyone that they only had a few short hours until everything really started up.

They were sitting back at the kitchen table eating takeaway Lily had consented to go get for them, Benjy's camera resting on the table and angled semi-accurately by a few magazines they'd found on the hutch in the corner. James had gotten quieter as the day went on, his smiles a bit softer, and now that they were sitting there (eating some of the best pasta Lily had ever had in her damn life) watching the crew buzzing around them, James seemed to almost completely retreat into himself.

James got changed into his tuxedo in near silence, didn't say anything when they came back downstairs and watched the crew buzzing around the courtyard. They were standing behind the front door the moment the sun dipped below the horizon, watching through the windows for the appropriate amount of darkness to set in. It was hard to tell with the bright lights set up all around the front courtyard, but Lily kept her eyes trained on the skyline, watched as rich oranges started to shift into darker blues and inky blacks. Finally, just around nine, she turned back to James and smiled encouragingly at him.

'Ready to go?'

James took a deep, shaky breath and looked at Lily. 'I — Evans, wait.'

Lily slipped her headset down over her head to get the chattering out of her ears. 'You alright?'

James took another breath, this one slower, but a bit steadier. 'Yeah,' he reached up and adjusted his glasses, 'yeah, I'm just a bit nervous. Is — what if I fuck this up?'

Lily hummed quietly in understanding. She turned and looked at Benjy standing just off to her left. 'Fen, can you — '

Benjy nodded, shifted the camera so that James' face was just out of the shot. Lily twirled her finger at James, signalling for him to turn around, and though he made a sceptical expression, he turned without hesitation. Lily reached up underneath the back of his suit jacket, careful to avoid brushing her fingers against his skin, and pulled his microphone wire out of the pack at the base of his back. She gave his back a gentle push to let him know that he could turn back around.

'Remind me to hook you back up when we're done,' she said and James nodded.

Lily gave him a bracing sort of look. 'Now, have you ever dated twenty women at once?'

'I thought twenty five — '

Lily shot him a look and James breathed a laugh. 'No,' he said, 'no, I haven't.'

'I get that you're nervous, James. This whole situation is new and really weird and it's okay to be unsure. You _are_ probably going to mess up a few times, but fucking up is alright, too. You've never done this before — it's going to take some getting used to. It's just like football, right? You've got to practise for ages before you're any good?'

'I can't believe you're trying to make a football reference,' James said, amusement crinkling the corners of his eyes. Lily reached out and pushed his shoulder, which turned out to be a mistake because it burst whatever control James had been holding onto and set him laughing.

Lily crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow at him. 'Are you done?'

Though he was still chuckling quietly to himself, James nodded and turned around so that Lily could plug his mic back in. When he spun round again, they were standing a bit closer than they were before

James reached out and touched his fingertips lightly to her elbow for a moment, his smile warm as he looked down at her. 'Thanks, Evans.'

Lily couldn't help the equally warm smile that filled her face as she nodded in return. 'Anytime.'

Lily saw Benjy adjust the angle of the camera as she slipped her headset back over her ears. She looked back up at James who had positioned himself back in front of the front door — there was still a certain stiffness about him, especially in the set of his shoulders, but he looked much more relaxed than he had a few moments before.

'You ready?'

James turned his head to look at her. 'As I'll ever be.'

Lily pressed the button on her radio, heard the subtle click in her earpiece that told her she was on. 'James is ready — exterior front, you ready for him?'

James held her gaze while Lily waited for a response, and though he couldn't hear it when it came through Lily's earpiece, she thought he must have read it on her face, because the moment they said, 'Send him out,' in her ear, James turned back around and reached for the door.


	13. Chapter 12

**I figured it was finally time to give you guys James interacting with a contestant or two or twenty.**

 **Happy Monday, my beautiful friends! x**

* * *

Whatever peace Lily had had earlier in the day, completely died the moment that James opened those doors.

Lily turned and smiled at Benjy as James walked down the front steps. 'See you tomorrow morning, Fen,' she said. 'I hope you enjoy your good night's sleep, you bastard.'

Benjy just laughed as he switched off his camera. 'I absolutely fucking will, Evans. Don't worry, I'll grab a few extra hours for you.'

Lily lightly punched his arm and Benjy just laughed. 'I'll see you tomorrow. Car's coming around ten — '

'I still can't believe that,' Lily hissed. 'Our flight isn't until the afternoon! Are we supposed to just sit at the airport for hours?'

Benjy adjusted his hold on his camera and shrugged. 'You know how it is, Lily.'

Lily breathed an annoyed sigh. 'No, I know, but still.' She leaned back to check that James was down the stairs (she'd heard them ask James to go back up and do another descent while she and Benjy had been talking) and didn't see him standing there.

'Alright, back to work for me.' She stepped forward and gave Benjy a quick kiss on the cheek. 'I'll see you tomorrow.' Benjy nodded his goodbyes as Lily turned and headed through the front door.

She walked down the front steps and met James near his spot just behind the front gate. Alice, one of their makeup artists, was patting a bit of powder across James' forehead, and smiled at Lily when she approached.

'Hey, Lily!' Alice finished up with James and wrapped Lily in a quick hug, careful not to accidentally powder the back of her hair.

'James said that he was working with you this series,' Alice said, pulling back and smiling at her. 'That's so exciting!'

Lily grinned. 'Yeah! I already like it better than working with the contestants.'

'Well, that's not surprising given how wonderful I am,' James said, shooting Lily a crooked smile. She rolled her eyes and Alice laughed.

'Is he always this cheeky?' she asked Lily.

Lily looked at James for a moment before she returned Alice's smile. 'Yes. Yes he absolutely is.'

Lily felt a light brush against her shoulder and jumped, turned to find Marlene standing there. 'God damn it, Mar,' Lily said, frowning as Marlene laughed at her. 'You scared me!'

'Sorry, love,' Marlene said, though she didn't look sorry at all. 'Wanted to let you know I've _arrived._ ' She put on her best Hollywood starlet voice and Lily snorted.

'God, you're obnoxious.'

Marlene just laughed and turned to James. 'You ready to start shooting?'

James' eyes flickered briefly towards Lily (she smiled encouragingly) before he grinned at Marlene. 'Absolutely.'

The routine of filming, it seemed, eased James up a bit, and Lily watched as his takes got progressively better and better. She was largely set off to the side, her headset half dangling off her head because she already couldn't stand all the people chattering away in her ears, but she would occasionally pop up and ask James if he needed anything or just go check and make sure that he was alright.

He and Marlene had established an easy rapport that translated well, even when they were doing take after take of the same short conversation about the night ahead. They would change subtle things, the inflection on certain words, where they placed their smiles, but each one made it clear that something of a genuine relationship already existed between them.

It wasn't altogether surprising that it seemed like James felt that comfortable already, given what Lily knew about Marlene, but it was still impressive.

Things got a bit more complicated, though, once the cars started pulling up outside the front gates with the contestants. Lily had just stepped forward to tell James that the first car would be there in five and rattled off the names of the contestants that would be arriving, and she watched as James' shoulders went stiff again and all the calm, easy charm he'd radiated during his conversation with Marlene fell away.

Instead of walking back to her spot, Lily turned back towards him, and Tom, one of the cameramen, barked at her. 'Oi! Evans, get out of the shot.'

Lily rolled her eyes. 'Piss off, Tom, I'll be out of it in a minute.' She turned to James. 'You alright?'

James was biting back a smile from, she assumed, her exchange the moment before, but he sobered and nodded. 'Just a bit of nerves creeping back up,' he said. 'I'll get it under control. These are almost like the ones I used to get before matches, so I'm used to them.'

'Oh, so _you're_ allowed to compare this to football but I'm not?'

James chuckled. 'I think I've more than earned that right, Evans.'

'You're a git,' that just set James full out laughing. 'Alright, I'm going back to my corner. Shout if you need anything.'

Marlene, who had settled herself beside the spot where Lily was planning on camping out for the duration of this part of the shoot, shot her a grin that reminded Lily of the one she'd given her when they'd all gone to lunch together the week before. Lily just raised her eyebrow, but Marlene shook her head.

'It's nothing, _Evans_. Don't you worry about it just yet.'

It was the _yet_ that Lily was worried about, but the next car pulled up a moment later, and Lily, determined to ignore whatever theory Marlene was cooking up now, pressed the button on her radio. 'Cara — let me know who's climbing out so I can tell James.'

'You got it Lily — first out will be Holly Hewitt. Event planner from Cornwall.'

Lily moved to tell James, who accepted the information with a slight nod. She could hear him repeating the name under his breath a few times as she walked away and did her best to conceal her smile.

Lily watched as a tall, wavy-haired brunette stepped out of the car a minute later, her face lighting up into a magnificent smile the moment she opened the door. She shut the car door quietly behind her and turned to walk towards James in the centre of the garden, before Jax, the director, shouted, 'Cut!'

Marlene groaned and leaned over to whisper, 'Here we fucking go,' into Lily's ear.

Lily sighed and turned to whisper back. 'And everyone wonders why these fucking shoots take an age. It's because Jax can't ever fucking let it go.'

They couldn't hear what Jax was saying to Holly from their spot on the other side of the courtyard, but on Holly's next trip out of the car, it became apparent that it was taking the time to shut the door behind her that had been Jax's problem. This time, Holly was allowed to walk through the front gate and up to James without any interruption, and she smiled even more widely when she reached him.

'Hi,' Holly said. She held out her hands for James — he took them and smiled at her. 'I'm Holly,' she continued, 'it's lovely to meet you.'

'You as well — '

'Cut!'

Jax came swooping out from behind the camera, and Lily and Marlene groaned in unison.

'This isn't a football fan meet and greet, Potter,' Jax said. 'You're meeting the woman that could be your _wife_ in a few weeks time. Tell her how beautiful she looks and send her on her way.'

And so it was with the next three women that rolled out of the back of Cara's car — Zoe Ainsley, a yoga instructor from Brighton, Anja Henrikson, a chef from Norway, and Jade Upton, a photographer from London — James got better at the "you look beautiful, NEXT" kind of interaction that Jax was looking for, but Jax still interrupted what felt like every two seconds to encourage James to "switch up his compliments" or "maybe hug a few, it doesn't have to be so fucking chaste!"

Finally, they got to the last contestant in the first car — Summer Blossom. Summer, much to Lily's amusement, was a dolphin trainer from the United States, and for the life of her, she could not keep it together as she communicated this to James.

'Her name is just too perfect,' Lily said, shaking her head to try and stop herself laughing. 'Her parents either did this on purpose or she changed her own name when she started working.'

James just rolled his eyes at her. 'Which state is Florida?'

'It's a Southern one? It's called the "Sunshine State," I think.' Lily pressed her lips together and James groaned.

'Get out of it, Evans.'

She patted him on the elbow and retreated to her corner with Marlene.

When Summer climbed out of the car a moment later, though, Lily had to hand it to her damn parents. It really did fit her — she had bright blonde hair, a glowing smile, and a warm, kind expression.

'Hey!' Summer popped forward and wrapped James in a hug.

James leaned briefly into her hug before he pulled back and smiled at her. 'That's some accent,' he said, 'Florida's in the south, I'm guessing?'

'They don't have accents like this in Florida,' she said, beaming at him. 'I'm from Alabama originally, but I moved to Florida when I went to college and now I live there training my dolphins!'

Everything she said sounded like it had sunshine injected into it. Lily almost wanted to be annoyed, but she was just… so damn infectious.

'She'll be here for a while,' Marlene said into Lily's ear. Lily nodded. 'Yes she fucking will be.'

The next few hours saw the arrival of twenty more women — Liza Branson, the red-headed football coach and teacher that Lily remembered from when she and James were flipping through their binders last month, and Olivia Mark, the retailer worker from Newcastle, were some of James' more obvious favourites from the remaining bunch. And, because it was _Eligible,_ James was also treated to a few very awkward jokes ("Hi James, I'm Ashley and I'm your _keeper_!") and women who Lily was _sure_ have been coached to come onto him more strongly than they otherwise would have.

Chloé Beauchêne's attempted snog session had Peter written all over it. He wouldn't resist the bit of drama that comes with someone being particularly forward, but, and Lily and Marlene abused him soundly for it from their spot on the wall, it was also just that Peter couldn't resist making a joke about "foreigners".

Lily could almost see how this will be framed on the final version of the show — they would be a bunch of mashed together footage and then it would be a hard cut to her trying to snog the breath out of James in the front garden.

They'd press him on it, Lily and some of the production team, but Peter would laugh and say "she's fine, it's not _my_ fault her type so bloody forward," and then he'd do what he wants anyway. And sure, he could do worse on the show, but was the fucking principle of the thing.

When the last contestant had been greeted and pointed into the house, the cameras clicked off and the crew immediately began packing away their gear. James walked over to Lily, confused look on his face, and pointed his thumb over his shoulder. 'Are — does that mean we're done?'

Lily and Marlene shared a brief look before they laughed. Lily shook her head at him. 'No, James, we're just getting started. You ready to head in?'

James tipped his head back in a yawn, but when he straighten up, he gave Lily a small nod.

Lily beamed and pointed him forward into the house. 'Onto phase two.'

The cocktail party portion of the evening started out fun. It had done last year and this year, Lily was pleased to see, was no different.

The house felt five, maybe ten degrees warmer with all the bodies and filming equipment, and so Lily wasn't surprised as she watched the contestants grab glass after glass of cold champagne from the wait staff as they glided through the room. As always, there wasn't a single food tray in sight.

James took two champagne flutes off the tray and smiled his thanks at the waiter. He turned to Lily and offered her one. 'Toast?'

She looked at the glass in his hand for a moment before looking up at him. 'I really shouldn't. I'm working.'

'Who cares about "shouldn't",' he grinned mischievously at her. 'What do you _want_ to do?'

Lily reached out and plucked the glass from his hand. 'Go to bed?'

James laughed. 'To going to bed,' and pinged his glass against hers. They drank, and when James lowered his glass, he was beaming at her.

Marlene slid out of the crowd in front of them and sighed. 'There you are,' she said. 'I couldn't find you. And _someone,'_ she looked a bit pointedly at Lily, 'has her radio off.'

Lily reached up and felt the band of her radio around her neck. 'Fuck, Mar, sorry. I forgot I'd taken it off outside.'

Marlene waved her off. 'No worries, just put it on before Peter sees. And you,' Marlene turned to James, 'you're coming with me.'

James shot Lily a look as Marlene tugged him away into the crowd, but she just smiled encouragingly as she finished adjusting her headset.

A hush fell along the edges of the room where the crew was standing, and Lily began moving through the crowd as Marlene started speaking so that she was at least in James' line of sight should he need her at some point.

'Good evening, everyone,' Marlene said. Lily could just see her smiling warmly out at the contestants circled around her and James over the heads of the crew in front of her. 'I hope that everyone's having a good night so far?'

A chorus of "yes" rippled through the crowd and Marlene beamed.

'Excellent. We're going to have a bit of fun tonight, but remember, this is your first opportunity to get to know James. Five of you will go home at the end of the night tonight, so do your best to find a way to speak to him and make that connection.'

The quiet seemed to shift, become more anxious as Marlene talked. It had been this way last year as well, and, Lily suspected, would be this way every year they did the show. The excitement of arriving and meeting James and then being rushed into this mansion and handed a glass of champagne was enough to dull even the keenest sense of competition. If Peter were smarter, she would fucking give him credit for setting it up like this, because it usually goes that, once the women were reminded that they weren't there for a party, that they were there to compete, all sense of friendship usually went out the window.

It made for great fucking television.

'Right now, though, let's focus on having fun! If everyone could raise their glass….' Marlene watched as every glass in the room went up into the air. Then she turned to James, smiled, and raised her own — 'To love!'

The contestants whooped as they finished their toast, and Lily watched as the women immediately began milling around the room, trying to figure out whether they should approach James directly or wait for him to come to them.

Lily settled into her spot on the wall and tried to let herself be entertained by the camera crew milling around and redirecting contestants, or Jax or Kate or Cara or whoever walking over and talking their contestants into doing one thing or another.

The night passed in a blur — the most notable time marker in Lily's memory was Mary rushing down from the office upstairs and telling Lily she'd printed and packed the schedules Lily had requested earlier that evening and then handing Lily a doughnut from crafts services.

They were out in the back garden now, Lily sitting on the stone wall off to the left, away from the direct heat of all the lights set up overhead. Once Lily had reminded him that they had set this bench up outside for quieter chat, James had brought a few women out here to start trying to get to know some of them — the woman who was sitting with him now (Laura?) had come out in the middle of James' (third) conversation with Liza and _kindly_ reminded her that she couldn't have James all to herself.

'God, Mary,' Lily said through her huge bite of doughnut, 'you're fucking wonderful.'

Mary beamed. 'I'm glad you think so.'

'I definitely wouldn't have made it through today if I'd had to go and do the stuff you just did after all this is over. Were there any other emails I needed to be aware of?'

Mary shook her head. 'There were a few from Peter, but — '

Lily waved her hand dismissively and Mary looked like she was trying not to smile. 'Nothing we can't talk about when we get to Greece,' Mary said. 'Nothing urgent.'

Lily rolled her eyes as she took another bite. 'Funny thing about Peter, Mary,' she said. 'It never fucking is.'

They chatted for a bit longer about what was waiting in Lily's inbox for her tomorrow morning before Lily finally had the sense to send Mary home.

'But — but what if you need me? I can stay! I'm not even tired!'

'Mary.' Lily raised an eyebrow. 'You're my second brain — you're who I'm going to be leaning on over the next few weeks to make sure that my head doesn't pop off trying to get James through this. I need you well rested and ready to go, and there won't always be time for that to happen. But right now, there _is_ time, and I want you to take advantage of it.'

Mary frowned. 'But — '

'They're getting ready to do the selection anyway,' Lily said. 'There's really nothing for _us_ to do after this is over besides get James into bed. Contestant side takes care of pretty much everything else.'

'Well I can — ' Lily shot Mary a look and she sighed. 'Alright. If I see anything come through the inbox on my way to the hotel, I'll text you?'

Lily nodded and smiled to herself as Mary made her way around the side of the house.

Mary was so much like Lily had been when she'd first gotten into television ten years ago — so bright and eager and ready to sacrifice anything in order to make it work. Lily had run herself into the ground on more shoots than she could remember, trying to outshine her previous performance, always trying to prove that she was talented enough to move up the ranks. She learned everything that she could, did things before she was asked, did anything that she could think of to prove to the producers, and, later, the executive producers, that she was determined and fucking brilliant at her job.

She saw so much of that in Mary, and though she wanted Mary to achieve whatever it was that she was aiming for, she didn't want her practically killing herself to get there. Lily, now that she was thirty, really, _really_ wished she'd been kinder to herself back then.

It really was only a few minutes before another PA came sweeping out into the back garden and shouting that they needed everyone inside for the selection. James stood up from the bench immediately, then seemed to regret his hastiness, because the woman on the bench beside him was frowning up at him in disappointment.

'Sorry,' James smiled at her, evidently trying to soften the unintended insult. 'I'm just so used to doing what I'm told the minute I hear it. Football player thing, I guess.'

The woman's expression softened a bit and she smiled. 'As long as you're not trying to escape from me. I couldn't have that.'

James laughed, but from where Lily was standing, it sounded a bit awkward. 'No, I'd never. Though I should — ' He tipped his head over to where Lily was standing and the woman nodded.

'Yeah, I guess I should go inside, too.' She stepped forward and ran her hand along James' forearm. She'd just started leaning forward when James stepped back and offered her a smile.

'I'll see you inside.'

'We could always walk in together,' she said, offering James a sultry smile.

'I've got to talk to my producer about something,' James said. He reached up and ruffled his hair. 'I'm glad that we got the chance to talk, Laura. It was nice.'

Laura beamed at him then. 'I'm glad we got to chat, too.'

It looked, to Lily, like she might have been trying to lean into him again, but James had already turned on his heel and started walking towards Lily.

'She's definitely not pleased that you decided not to walk her in.'

James sighed, annoyed, and rolled his eyes. 'She'll live.'

He took a long drink from the champagne in his hand and Lily looked at him, surprised. James was apologising, though, before Lily could even say anything.

'I'm sorry.' He took another long drag from his glass, heaved another sigh. 'I just — I didn't mind that she interrupted, you know? She wanted time with me and she came out here to get it and she was polite to Liza and that's all great. But then Liza left and Laura sits down and all she can do for the first like ten minutes we're sitting there is talk shit about everyone else in the room.

'I just don't know what she expected that would do,' James continued, now running a frustrated hand through his hair. 'She was really just… she really was awful about some of the women in there and I don't want someone like that here. I'm not going to click with someone that's an arsehole for no reason, you know?'

'Keep in mind,' Lily said, 'that this is all part of the show. It's possible that Laura was acting entirely on her own, in which case, she's just a dick. But it's also possible that the producer responsible for her encouraged her to behave like that for one reason or another. It can be difficult to tell sometimes — last series, we had a contestant like Laura and it took me weeks to figure out that George — have you met George yet? — that he was telling her to act like that because our bachelor preferred "aggressive go-getters".'

James frowned. 'But there's a difference between being aggressive and going after what you want and being a complete arsehole. You shouldn't need to drag other people down to make yourself fucking look better!'

As much as she agreed with him, they really didn't have time for this.

'Here,' she said, hoping that he would let her take him along in this new, more productive direction, 'let's do this. Who do you think you're going to let go tonight? I've got to run this by the execs before we move forward anyway.'

'Definitely Laura.'

Lily nodded as she scrolled through the list. 'Laura,' she said. 'Laura Banner from Oxford.'

James nodded and Lily added Laura to the list.

'Alright. Who else?'

'Uh.…' James frowned in concentration as he tried to remember details from the night, recapture feelings that had long since escaped him. 'Holly was sweet,' he said at last, 'but I just don't think we're compatible, you know? She's — she's great, but —'

Lily could see that James was desperate to communicate that there was a reason they hadn't clicked, that there was some kind of logic behind his decision to let her go. That it rested on firmer ground than "I just don't think we clicked," especially considering the fact that his decision with Laura was very concrete.

'You know that you can just _not click_ with someone, right? You don't need a reason for everything.'

James frowned. 'I know, but —'

'James.'

He sighed. 'Alright. No Holly.'

Lily nodded. 'No Holly.'

When she had the list of five people that James wanted to send home, and a few alternates just in case Peter vetoed any of their decisions, she lead James up onto the small deck just off the lounge where the contestants were waiting. A few of them shouted out when they noticed James standing outside, trying to get his attention, but James just waved and smiled.

Lily wrapped her hand around his forearm and tugged him out of the light so he would be more difficult to see from inside.

James sent her a cheeky smirk as they moved into the slightly shadowy part of the deck. 'Getting possessive, Evans?'

Lily snorted, smacked the side of the arm she'd been holding. 'You're an idiot.'

James grinned at her. 'So, where are we going now?'

' _You_ are going to go sit in the lounge with the contestants and chat for a while. Get to know them a bit more. I've got to go clear the final list with Peter,' James scowled as she said his name, but Lily ignored him.

'I'll survive, James, I assure you.'

James muttered something about "that not being the point," but she really wasn't about to engage with him on this. They were rapidly approaching dawn and she _really_ didn't want to have to listen to Jax start shouting about lighting.

'You'll have about a half an hour with the women now,' Lily said, taking James by the arm and leading him back towards the house. 'Mill around a bit, talk to some new people. If you need anything, you know what Cara and Kate look like, right?'

James nodded but sent her something of a wry smile. 'You know that I've survived thirty years without your constant guidance right?'

Lily rolled her eyes. 'Don't pretend like you don't need me. It's an obvious lie.'

James laughed and nudged her lightly with his elbow as they walked back into the lounge. He looked like he was about to say something, but the moment that one of the women — Lena? — noticed that James had walked back into the room, she rushed over to him.

'James! We were wondering where you'd got to!'

James gave Lily a quick look, but didn't resist when Lena wrapped her hand through the crook of his elbow and led him into the centre of the group in the middle of the room.

Lily watched for a moment to make sure that he was settled, bit back her smile as the women floating around the outside of the circle did their best to slide towards the centre near James. James, apparently having noticed the fact that the three women currently talking to him were the same three that he'd spoken to all night, took a champagne flute from the nearest waiter and started making his way through the group towards the outer edges.

Lily pressed the button on her radio as she watched. 'Peter, where are you? Got some things to go over.'

Peter wasn't usually the most responsive, but after five minutes of standing in the lounge (now watching as James talked with Olivia, Claire, and Summer in a corner), she finally decided to just go find Peter's stupid arse herself. She turned on her heel and started towards the front of the house, figuring that she could start upstairs and work her way down as necessary.

He was almost never in the centre of the action anyway, so the production room seemed like the most obvious place to start.

She was about halfway up the stairs when Peter's voice finally popped into her ear. 'Production room, kid. See you in a mo.'

'Literally a mo,' Lily mumbled angrily under her breath 'because I'm already here, you fucking prat.'

She did feel mildly validated, though, for guessing correctly.

She knocked on the door of the production room as she was pushing it open, and Peter turned around in the office chair he was sitting in.

'Lil!' He smiled at her and gestured towards the couch against the wall. 'Have a seat.'

Lily shook her head. 'I haven't got a lot of time,' _as you should fucking know._ 'I left James downstairs with the contestants, so I need to get these names back.'

Peter frowned. 'Alright, read them off, then.'

'Laura Banner — '

'No.'

'W — what? Why?' She'd expected a bit of resistance — there always was with Peter — but she didn't expect it this fucking early.

'Laura stays.'

'Peter,' Lily spoke like she was explaining something complex to a child, 'they don't get on. He doesn't like her. He's terrible at hiding his bloody feelings, it's going to —'

'That's even better, Evans. _Why does Potter keep her when he so clearly can't stand her?_ ' He spread his hands out in front of him as he imagined the headline. 'Can you imagine the drama we'd get from the other girls, too? They'd realise that he hated her and yet, here she is. Is she only here because she's a fit blonde? Is Potter really that shallow? Is it all about sex for him? What about love?'

Lily was struggling to keep her temper in check despite the anger flaring up inside her. There were times to blow up at Peter, there were times to push back and challenge him — those times were not when she was alone in a room with him and she had a fucking deadline, but it was also impossible to sit here and let him cook up some kind of character defamation plot.

'Or,' she said, 'people could start to question how much influence production has on the show. It could remove the feeling of authenticity that we cultivated last year.'

She didn't believe a word of it, but it was all she could think to — 'Well, whatever, Evans. It's my final word and my final word is Laura stays. She's my override.'

Lily sucked in a sharp breath and tried to tame the anxiety starting to twist in her gut. His fucking override. James was going to have a stroke.

'Who else have you got?'

Lily ground her teeth together to stop herself retaliating (and thought, for a moment, of her poor dentist giving her that _look_ again when she went back to him next). She looked down at the list in her hand and pulled in a long, quiet breath before she looked back up at him.

'Holly Hewitt.'

Peter clapped his hands together, a broad smile on his face. He looked sick, kind of twisted when he looked like that, and Lily had to look away.

'Excellent. She's sweet as hell from what I've heard, that will really challenge the idea that James is here for the right reasons, especially once he keeps Laura.'

Peter ultimately decided, surprising no one, that James should send "that sketchy-looking French girl" home in Laura's place, and Lily left the production room with a finalised list and a tension headache.

She walked as quickly as she could without actually running back down the stairs — she needed to put as much distance as was physically possible between herself and Peter right now, because otherwise she knew that she'd be tempted to storm back in there and resume the argument.

Not only would that not get her what she wanted, but it would also probably end up with her either getting fired or blacklisted. And being on Peter's shitlist was the absolute _last_ place that you wanted to be, because he had a real gift for making your life a living hell once he decided that he didn't like you, and he already barely tolerated Lily as it was.

James was talking to a different group of women when Lily slid back into the room, a tall brunette that Lily _thought_ was called Victoria and two other women that Lily didn't know. She was careful to stay along the edges of the room to avoid drawing attention to herself (and to make sure that she wasn't in Jax's shot), but James must have noticed her come in, because he looked up and scanned the room for a moment, gave her a brief smile when his eyes found hers.

He looked so much more relaxed than he had done through most of the evening, and Lily smiled to herself as he turned back towards the women he'd been talking with and resumed their conversation. He looked happy, animated, and it was that attitude that was going to win the public over for James. It wouldn't matter what Peter was trying to do in the way of sabotage if James could continue to look as charming as he looked right now.


	14. Chapter 13

**Andddddd a bit more**

* * *

When Marlene walked into the room a short while later, tapping a fork against the champagne flute in her hand as she went, nearly everyone froze. Those with their backs towards her turned around to face her, the anxiety clear on all of their faces.

This was always the part where Lily started to feel really, really bad for them.

'I hope everyone had a nice time tonight,' Marlene said, smiling around at the room. The contestants all nodded stiffly and said 'Yes,' and Marlene's smile widened.

'Lovely. Now, I'm sorry, but it's time for me to take James away for a little bit.'

The tension in the room increased palpably.

James moved slowly out of the centre of the crowd that had formed around him, muttering, 'Excuse me,' as he went. When he reached the front of the room, he paused and turned to face the contestants again.

'It's been really wonderful getting to know all of you so far. You're all really amazing people, and I wish that I could keep all of you. I've got a really tough decision to make.'

A few of the women nodded, but most just looked anxiously down at their shoes or adjusted the hem of their dress. James hesitated for a moment before he cleared his throat.

'I'll see you all soon.'

Jax made James re-shoot his little speech once more ('You don't need to look so fucking nervous, Potter! You need to be confident! Radiate that confidence! It's sexy!') before Marlene was allowed to escort him from the lounge into the decision room they'd set up in one of the bedrooms upstairs.

They stayed silent as they walked out of the room to avoid being overheard by the contestants, but once they rounded the corner towards the entry way, Lily leaned towards James.

'You two will just film some shots of you talking about the women you definitely want to keep,' Lily said, 'and then we'll do the ones that you're going to be eliminating tonight. Sound good?'

James nodded. 'Have you got the final list?'

Lily hoped that James didn't hear the tension in her voice when she replied. 'In my pocket.'

Marlene turned and grinned at James as they started making their way up the stairs towards the decision room.

'Prepare yourself,' she said, 'it's going to look like a shrine in there.'

James snorted. 'What?!'

Lily chuckled under her breath as they reached the top of the stairs. 'You'll see.'

They turned and walked into the bedroom across the hall from James' and James immediately burst into laughter. There was a table along the far wall covered in candles and head shots for each of the women on the show. They were meant to be there to remind James (and the audience) who was who, but the whole effect had something of a creepy worshipper vibe about it.

'Holy shit,' James turned around and raised his eyebrows at them, 'you weren't kidding!'

Marlene and Lily laughed.

'Shouldn't you know by now,' Lily said, 'that we absolutely mean everything we say when we're talking to you about this show?'

'Well, I don't know,' James said, 'I just didn't think that it would honestly look this… intense.'

'Then clearly you have no idea what you've signed up for,' Lily said.

Jax chose that moment to come bustling in. 'Chat with Potter another time, Lil, we've got things to shoot.'

Lily gave Marlene a look and rolled her eyes, but moved to the corner beside the cameraman, Will, so that she was out of Jax's way. She whispered her hello to Will as Jax started barking orders.

'Mar, if you both could walk in again, let me get a few shots of Potter's face when he first sees the selection room, that would be great. Then we'll move on to the conversation pieces. Sound good?'

Marlene nodded, led James out of the room, and so the filming began.

They managed to get most of the shots that Jax needed in two or three attempts, something that Jax (and Lily) was immensely happy about. The quicker that they were able to get through these conversations about the contestants, the quicker they could get downstairs and actually get through the selection process.

Despite how quickly they were moving through it, though, it was still almost an hour before they were even close to finished shooting the bits for those chosen to go to the next round. Lily desperately had to pee, so she leaned over and whispered to Will that she'd be right back before she slid out from behind him and started making her way towards the door. She was halfway towards the door when Jax cut the shot, and Lily figured she could at least take this opportunity to see if anyone needed anything.

'Anyone need water? I'm stepping out.'

'Water would be great, Lil,' Marlene said, smiling at her. Lily looked towards James and he thought for a moment before he shook his head.

'No, thanks, Evans, I'm alright.'

She nodded, and slipped out the door before Jax could start complaining about how she was wasting his time. When she returned a few minutes later, water bottles from the secret crafts services stash in her hands, she paused at the door to see if she could hear what was going on inside. Naturally, she couldn't hear a damn thing, so she decided to just walk quietly into the room and cross her fingers that they weren't in the middle of something important.

It didn't end up mattering that she'd been quiet, though, because the moment she slid in through the door, James beamed at her. 'Evans!'

'Cut.' Jax groaned and shot Lily a look. 'Couldn't you'd've waited until we were finished getting the shot?'

'Oh, I'm sorry, Jax,' Lily said, walking into the centre of the room, 'am I supposed to be able to see through walls now?'

Jax rolled his eyes. 'Just make it quick, please. We've only got four more hours until sunlight.'

Marlene shot her a look when Lily crossed the room to hand her her water, but Lily just shook her head. They could, and would, complain about Jax at _length_ later.

Lily turned to look at Jax. 'Where are you at?'

'We just finished filming the women that he's keeping,' he said, his tone swift and a bit clipped, but not rude. 'We're ready for the rejection list when you're ready to give it to us.'

'Alright, the final list — ' Lily pulled her mobile out of her pocket and unlocked it, bracing herself against the inevitable impact of the list she was about to read out. 'Holly Hewitt, Rebekah Acker, Carmel Rafferty, Ashley Smith, and Chloé Beauchêne.'

Marlene nodded and opened her mouth to say something, but James, gaping at Lily from the moment she'd finished her list, beat her to it.

'What? Wh — where's Laura? Why's Chloé on there? She wasn't even one of our alternates!'

'I know,' Lily ran a frustrated hand through her hair. 'Believe me, I told Peter that when he suggested her, but he insisted.'

'Laura? Why doesn't he want me to send home Laura?'

Because he wants to try and make it look like you're secretly a huge arsehole.

'He just thinks that she's a more compelling character than some of the other people on the show,' Lily said, careful to keep her voice even. 'He didn't think that Chloé is going to be interesting to the audience and he'd rather us get rid of her earlier rather than later.'

'Can he do this?! Make me keep someone on?'

'He — yeah, James he can. There's a clause in your contract that says he is allowed to override one of your choices and keep a contestant on through week five.'

'But—'

'Look, James,' Marlene said, 'I know that this is confusing, especially because you and Laura don't click, but just because production is keeping her on _doesn't_ mean that you need to spend a lot of alone time with her. Most of the dates over the next two weeks are going to be group dates, and you can keep Laura in that bracket for a few weeks, appease production, and then you can eliminate her.'

James looked at Lily for confirmation and she nodded.

'It really is the best we can do at this point. I —' She shot Marlene a look, 'It's best not to ruffle feathers at this point. It's so early in the process. And it's in your contract... James, honestly, our hands are tied.'

James was quiet for a long minute before he finally nodded.

Jax practically screamed his relief at the ceiling. 'Thank fucking christ.'

He strode quickly into the centre of the room, took James by the shoulder and redirected him towards his mark. 'Let's get these damn shots, people. The sooner we finish, the sooner we can all go home and get some fucking sleep.'

Lily caught Marlene's eye as she retreated to her spot beside Will, and Marlene nodded imperceptibly at Lily's unasked question. _Tomorrow._

When James and Marlene started filming their conversation about the women that they were letting go, though, it became clear that this was going to be more difficult for James than Lily initially thought. James managed to come up with decent enough reasons for everyone on the list, but once Jax had him filming a few takes of him talking about sending Chloé home, all of that went down hill.

'Potter,' Jax leaned around the camera so that James could see him from his mark. 'I know that you're still all twisted up about this _why can't I let go of the woman I want to_ drama, but come on. Daylight is approaching — just make something up!'

James, though, wasn't able to think of a goddamn thing.

He was halfway through a convoluted explanation about how she was "forward, but that's not necessarily a bad thing because really he appreciated it when people were a bit forward", and Jax, apparently, had decided that he'd had enough.

'Cut!' Everyone jumped and Jax walked back out from behind the camera.

'Alright, I think we got it,' Jax said, barely suppressing the eye roll that Lily knew he so desperately wanted to give them.

'Jax,' Marlene gave him a deadpan look. 'You and I both know that we don't have it. Sorry, James.' She shot him a quick, apologetic look, but James just shrugged.

'Look, I don't care, we're losing light. And anyway,' Jax blew a piece of hair out of his eyes, 'we don't need footage for every elimination decision. We just won't include that particular decision.'

Marlene raised her eyebrows, and though she was trying to look serious, Lily could see the smile starting at the corners of her mouth. 'And what are you going to tell Peter?'

'Peter can rain his hellfire down on my head for all I fucking care,' Jax said, turning away from them and moving towards the door. 'We don't have time for this. I'll see you lot downstairs.'

They waited until they heard Jax start down the stairs towards the selection room, before Marlene turned to Lily, the smile she'd been suppressing finally working it's way onto her face.

'I know he's a bit of an arsehole,' she said, the smile blooming across her face, 'but —'

'I know,' Lily grinned, 'me, too.'

Marlene shook her head, still laughing as she walked out of the room, and Lily turned towards James.

'Ready?'

He'd been looking at his feet when she'd turned around, watching as he shuffled them from side to side. He looked up when she spoke, a more anxious expression on his face again.

'As I'll ever be.'

He sounded so tired now and Lily did her best to suppress the urge to just push him across the hall into his room and let him go to bed.

They made their way down the stairs, James clutching onto the banister a bit more intensely than he had at any other point in the day. They turned left at the bottom of the stairs instead of right this time, started towards the room they'd converted for the selection instead of the lounge where James had left the contestants an hour and a half before. Lily put her hand on his elbow when they reached the end of the corridor and he paused, turned to look at her.

'Take a deep breath,' she said, taking one of her own in hopes that he would mimic her. She smiled at him when he followed suit and squeezed his elbow lightly before dropping her hand. 'I know that this isn't going to be easy and I know that you're exhausted, but it'll only be a few more hours and then you're done. Just go out there and give the names of the women you want to keep. You don't need to give reasons or anything. Just the names.'

James nodded slowly, his head almost heavy as he moved it up and down. Then she moved to the side and James walked into the selection room.

The women were already standing along the opposite wall, three rows of about eight women each on risers they'd set up so that James could at least see the faces of everyone that he was about to list off. There was a pedestal in the middle of the room with a tray of champagne flutes for the women to take from as they walked behind James once they'd been selected, a small dot of tape on the ground to mark where James was supposed to stand.

Jax waved his hand in a quick circle the moment he noticed James and Lily standing just outside the room.

'Alright everyone, let's get this entry shot in one, yeah?'

The selection, as it always did, took a fucking _age._ It would get a bit faster, Lily knew, when she wasn't having to step forward every time and remind him who was who and when there weren't two dozen women standing in front of them, but it was going to take a long time before they got to that point.

Each selection involved several camera angles, two or three takes, and, though James was always supremely embarrassed whenever it was necessary, photographs of the women when James couldn't remember the face that went with the name. They conferred before each selection — James would tell her the name of the woman he wanted to keep, if he remembered it, Lily would pull up her picture on her phone, and, if James confirmed she was the same, he made his choice to the camera. If not, they dug through Lily's photobank for a few minutes while the contestants watched anxiously.

'I feel so fucking terrible about this,' James said, scrubbing a hand through his hair as he and Lily started looking through her photobank for the third time that hour. 'I should be able to remember them all, but I just —'

'James,' Lily didn't look up, just kept scrolling. 'You've had a fucking whirlwind of an evening.'

'But they all remember my name!'

'James.' This time Lily did look up, and when she did, she noticed the redness of his eyes, the slight alcoholic sweetness of his breath as he stood over her. She didn't know him well enough to know whether or not he was completely pissed, but he was certainly feeling _something_ from all the alcohol.

Alcohol that she should have kept a closer fucking eye on.

But she could soundly abuse herself for that later — she just needed to get him through this night and into bed to sleep it off. Or sleep off what he could.

'James,' she softened her tone and moved to press her hand lightly against the back of the arm closest to her. 'There's only one of you for them to remember. And the crew have been pumping champagne into you all night. It's alright that you can't remember everyone.'

James nodded a bit jerkily.

'You're almost done,' she said, and though it wasn't anywhere _near_ the truth, he nodded as though he believed her. 'You can come over here as many times as you need and I'll tell you every single damn name. We're almost done.'

It took another hour for James to finally get through most of the remaining contestants. The sun was just starting to lighten the very edge of the horizon and everyone in the room was starting to let their exhaustion show — the crew was snappier, the contestants shifted more in the background (causing Jax to damn near have a mental breakdown). The only one who managed to look coherent through it all was Marlene.

Marlene finally stepped forward to announce the last contestant and smiled gently at the six women remaining on the other side of the room. 'There's only one more spot open tonight. James,' she reached out and touched James lightly on the back of his elbow, 'when you're ready.'

James cleared his throat awkwardly as Marlene stepped back and his eyes darted towards Lily's again. The nerves were written all over his face, made worse by the exhaustion she was sure he was fighting through. You couldn't tell from looking at him (largely because Alice had slapped more concealer on him than Lily had ever seen in her life a few hours before), but they'd been shooting now for, Lily looked at her watch and bit back a groan, seven hours — he had to be so ready for bed. She knew she was.

James rocked once onto the balls of his feet (stopping immediately when Jax shouted at him to quit), before he turned and smiled at the contestants standing opposite him.

'It really was wonderful meeting all of you tonight,' he said, and Lily could tell from the look on his face that it was taking an enormous amount of effort to keep his voice steady. 'But unfortunately, I can only take one more woman with me into next week.'

He hesitated for a long moment, his eyes on his hands, before he looked up again. 'Laura, I'd like you to stay. If you're willing.'

Laura's barely suppressed glee positively radiated from her as she glided across the room towards James. She pressed herself up onto her toes, making sure to brush her hips against his, and kissed his cheek. When she pulled back, she smiled winningly at him, and when Lily noticed the faces of some of the contestants standing behind James, she realised that _this_ was why Peter had insisted that they keep Laura on for a few weeks.

It was more than just the fact that she was willing to badmouth the other women that were here with her. It was that most everyone in the room already seemed to hate her.

And what's more, judging by the look on Laura's face and she slid into place beside Liza and turned to face the camera, she fucking knew it.

'Ladies,' Marlene stepped back into the room beside James, smiled sadly at the five women standing on the opposite side of the room. 'I'm so sorry. If you weren't selected, please take a moment and say your goodbyes.'

The remaining contestants moved one by one across the room as Jax announced them, took a moment to say goodbye to James before moving along the line of selected women behind them and hug those they'd managed to form bonds with while they'd been filming. James looked genuinely sorry for each woman that approached him, taking their hands before leaning into the hugs they gave him, apologising, wishing them the best. There was very little that he could say that would actually make them feel better about having been eliminated, but Lily was impressed with how he was managing the situation, knew that it would translate well on camera no matter how it was edited.

When he was finished saying his goodbyes to the women he'd eliminated, James crossed the room towards Lily at double time, completely failing to notice the few women reaching out to get his attention from the line behind him, and came to a stop in front of her.

'Can I go to bed now? Please can I go to bed now?'

He must have had more to drink that Lily realised, or maybe it was the exhaustion coupled with the drink (and the fact that James hadn't had anything to eat since they'd eaten dinner round six). Either way, James' words were slurred a bit at the edges, he was looking a bit unsure on his feet, and she could definitely smell the alcohol on his breath now.

 _Fuck._

'We've just got one more bit to shoot, James, and then you can get to bed, I promise.'

She half expected him to complain — _she_ would have been complaining hours ago — but James just nodded jerkily and cleared his throat. 'What have I got to do?'

They made sure that the women who'd been eliminated were out of the room before the remaining contestants were organised in a group in front of James in the centre of the room. James had been given a champagne glass like each of the remaining women, but he was eyeing it like it was the absolute last thing that he wanted to be looking at right now, much less holding in his hand.

He smiled lightly at the women in front of him, and Lily couldn't help but admire how he was managing to rally despite being both completely pissed and exhausted.

'Well, that was a long night!' He smiled warmly and the contestants chuckled and agreed.

'Today was tough, but I'm so glad to be standing here right now with such an amazing group of women in front of me. We're going to have a lot of fun over the next few weeks, and I can't wait to get to know all of you a bit better.

'I can't say _too_ much about what I have in store, but I can tell you that next week is going to bright and sunny, and maybe a bit sandy.'

The contestants 'ooh'ed with excitement and James grinned as he raised his glass up just a bit.

'Let the journey begin.'

A chorus of 'Cheers!' rang out around the room and once they'd clinked glasses and everyone had taken drinks from their glass, Jax cut the shot, and everyone, cast and crew, let out a collective exhausted groan.

'Alright, James,' Lily crossed the room and laid a hand on his elbow to get his attention. 'You're good to head upstairs to bed. You gonna be alright to go on your own or do you need help?'

'No, no, no,' James waved his hand a bit wildly at her. 'I'm — I'm alright, Evans, I'm a grown man.'

But then James stumbled as he turned to walk away from her and Lily took hold of his elbow and started walking them through the entrance hall. Grown man he might be, but Lily wasn't going to let his drunken pride send him tumbling down the stairs.

'I'm alright, Lily, really,' he said, and then he straightened a bit, turned and smiled a goofy, lopsided smile at her. 'Hey! Lily. I almost never call you Lily because I like Evans but Lily is nice, too.'

Lily nodded as they reached the top of the stairs. 'I'm fond of it, yes.'

'Do you like it when I call you Evans? Should I stop? Do you want me to call you Lily?'

'No, James,' Lily turned into James room, 'I like it when you call me Evans. No one else has ever done that.'

'So I'm special?'

'Yeah,' Lily smiled at him as she turned him — slowly — and sat him back onto the bed. 'You're special.'

He just looked at her then, a slightly glazed look in his eyes.

'Here,' Lily grabbed a water bottle off this bedside table. 'Drink some of this.'

'I don't want that.'

'I don't care. You're dehydrated and you need to drink this or you're going to feel like hell tomorrow.'

'I don't get hungover.'

'Maybe you didn't when you were twenty,' Lily said, 'but you're thirty fucking years old now, James. Drink the damn water.'

She held it out to him, a stern look on her face and though James sighed, a long, exaggerated sigh, he took the water bottle from her and took a long drink. He went to hand it back to her, and Lily pointed at the bedside table. 'Just put it there. You'll need it.'

'But I —'

' _Don't get hungover,_ ' she said, imitating his voice. 'Whatever. When I come here to get you tomorrow morning, though,' she said, 'that water better be gone.'

'Or else?' James was grinning at her now, a loose, lopsided grin that was, actually, not all that different from his usual silly smiles.

It took damn near everything she had not to start with him. 'Yes.'

His smile widened. 'Or else what?'

She gave him a stern look. 'The last man to ask me that didn't live to tell the tale. Now lay down and go to sleep.'

He looked down at his clothes and groaned. 'Wait, Lily, I don't want to sleep in this suit. Where are my comfy clothes?'

And they were back to James the overgrown child.

Lily laughed before she can stop herself and James looked back up at her, lower lip jutted out into a pout. 'Are you laughing at me?'

Lily shook her head, reached out and patted James' cheek affectionately. 'I would never.'

James crossed his arms. 'You laugh at me all the time.'

'You're funny, James. I laugh at you because you're making me laugh.'

James hummed like he didn't quite believe her as he pulled his suit jacket awkwardly off his shoulders. He removed his glasses and tossed them onto the bedside table, started fumbling with his tie, loosening the knot jerkily before he yanked it over his head. He pulled his shirttails from the waistband of his trousers and attempted to start unbuttoning his shirt — but after one, two, three attempts at the same button, James huffed, frustrated.

'Evans.' He looked up at her, an almost comical frown on his face. 'Can you help me?'

She swallowed the inexplicable nerves that had made their way into her throat and nodded. She stepped forward so that she was standing between his knees and moved her hands to the button at the base of his throat. James tipped his head back a bit and sighed with exaggerated relief as Lily undid the button and the collar of his shirt fell open.

She smiled and rolled her eyes at him when he picked his head back up and looked at her. He smiled back, a wide, toothy smile, before his expression slowly shifted into one that was a bit more… not serious, but intense. His breathing had picked up — she could feel it in the rise and fall of his chest underneath her hands as she continued undoing his buttons — and something in his expression had definitely shifted and it was making her own breathing quicker, a bit shallower.

She dropped her gaze to her hands, watched as her fingers undid each button (and did her best to avoid looking at the skin of James' chest underneath).

'Do you like me, Evans?' He'd spoken so softly, and so suddenly, that she jumped a little.

'Sorry,' he said, 'I didn't mean to — '

'No, that's okay,' she said. 'I just wasn't expecting it.'

He hummed and she felt the vibration of it in her fingertips.

'So….' He trailed off, and it took Lily a moment to remember what it was that he wanted from her.

Yeah, James,' she kept her eyes trained on the buttons she was undoing, 'I like you. We're great friends.'

James didn't seem to have anything to say in response. He sat quietly while Lily finished, and, when she stepped back, he reached up and slid the shirt down over his shoulders. She walked over to his case in the corner and started searching for a pyjama shirt while James kicked his trousers off and slid under the blankets. He pulled the t shirt she offered him over his head and immediately fell back onto the pillows behind him.

Lily straightened the blankets around James' shoulders a bit (instead of reaching up and brushing the hair from his eyes like she wanted to), pulled a small travel packet of paracetamol from her jeans pocket and set it on James' bedside table beside the water bottle.

James gave her a look and she shrugged. 'I always carry it on me during shoots. You never know when you're going to get a headache.'

James reached out from underneath the blankets, touched his hand to her wrist. She paused and turned back round to face him. His eyes were barely open and he was fighting through a yawn, but as he turned onto his side towards her, she saw a slight smile lift the left corner of his mouth.

'Thank you, Lily.'

She nodded, 'Anytime, James,' before she turned and walked quietly from the room.


	15. Chapter 14

**I'm travelling and we decided to go up to the mountains today, so here, you get this early. I edited this in a bit of a rush this morning so hopefully I caught my typos - enjoy, friends x**

* * *

The sun was up when Lily walked out of the villa and across the street to her hotel. Not just up like "peeking over the horizon" up, but properly up, "shining brightly and waking everyone the fuck up" up.

She made her way through the lobby, into the lift, and managed to find the correct room, but, if pressed, Lily wouldn't be able to remember how she'd gotten there. She collapsed, fully dressed, onto her bed the moment she walked into the door, used the last bit of her energy to toe her shoes off her feet and onto the floor. She didn't remember taking her radio off, but she woke up with it in a tangle on the bed beside her, so she must have done at some point.

Her alarm started going off just, _fuck,_ three hours after she'd gotten in, and though she knew that she had to get up, she was prepared to give almost anything for just a few more hours of sleep.

She'd almost sooner quit than drag herself out of bed.

Almost.

She pushed herself up off the mattress with a groan, slid onto the floor and brushed her hair out of her eyes. Now that she was conscious, she could hear the buzz of the city outside, could feel the warmth of the sun streaming through the window on the other side of the room. It was (she confirmed it when she opened her blinds) another bright, warm day — it was going to make getting onto a plane all that much harder.

At least they were going to Greece where it was, probably, equally sunny.

She showered and dressed in something of a haze. There wasn't much that she needed to do in the way of re-packing because she hadn't really unpacked anything when she arrived, and so she just gathered up the few things she'd left around, stuffed her dirty clothes into their designated bag, and then did one more sweep of the room before leaving to check out. It was still a bit early, nine thirty when she last checked her watch, but she figured that she could go try that cafe the hotel staff had recommended to her the other day when she'd checked in. It was a five minute walk from the hotel, and after getting directions again from the receptionist, she set out on her way.

The sound of the city got a bit louder as she stepped out onto the street, but this, overall, didn't seem to be a particularly bustling part of Rome. It was far, she thought, from most of the more touristy areas, though she'd need a map to confirm whether or not that was true. Maybe it was louder at night, but Lily had no way of knowing. She'd hit the bed like a rock her first night there, they'd been filming all night the night before, and now they were leaving before bloody _noon,_ and so this part of Rome was just going to remain something of a mystery to her.

Another place she'd been to but hadn't _been._

She nearly walked past the cafe when she arrived — she only caught it because someone was opening the door just as she was getting ready to walk past and her small section of pavement was flooded with the scent of the most delicious coffee she'd ever smelled in her life and she stopped dead in her tracks. She was practically salivating as she walked in and was surprised to find that, other than the two people currently standing at the counter, there wasn't even a _queue._

How in the fuck this place flew so low under the radar, she'd never know, but she was glad of it just then.

She ordered herself a cappuccino and a creme croissant, and grabbed a seat by the window where she could watch the people milling about outside. The coffee was hot, but she didn't mind — she sipped away and relaxed into her seat as the pressure running around the edges of her brain started to fall away, and she slowly (slowly) started to feel more awake.

She probably should have texted Marlene before she'd left to see if she was awake, maybe even gone to wake James a bit earlier than she'd been planning and let him get out into the city. She probably should have, but she was glad to have a bit of time to herself that morning, especially after last night.

She hadn't had much time to think about it then, hadn't, of course, thought about anything on her walk back home earlier that morning, but now that she was awake again and at least a little caffeinated, she could feel the need to start to work out this… thing that she was carrying for James.

A thing that she was trying very hard to deny even existed, but which continued to persist nevertheless.

No matter what she said to Marlene (or what she tried to convince herself), it was a bit more than just recognising that he was fit while enjoying his totally platonic friendship. The way she'd reacted to him last night, his stupid, drunken words, and the way it felt when her fingertips brushed against his ridiculous chest as she unbuttoned his shirt for him… it wasn't platonic for her. Not at _all._

She was going to have to put on her best face, though, and pretend, because he was on a fucking _marriage show._ And anyway, there was no way that her feelings for him could be serious. They could be sexual (they were definitely sexual), but that didn't mean that they had to be serious.

That was the line she was going to toe anytime Marlene pressed her on it (because Lily would bet all her savings that Marlene would bring it up again) — it was how she was going to get through the next few weeks without doing something incredibly stupid.

Sexual feelings could be ignored (or redirected). Serious ones could not.

She ordered more coffee and several croissants before she left, deciding that, if she was going to have alone time in the morning, she could at least get James and Benjy something to wake themselves up.

Though, knowing fucking Benjy, he'd probably already been on a run and had like eight coffees and a protein shake. He was going to be the _most_ insufferable today, and she was not going to be held responsible for killing him.

The walk back to the villa seemed longer for the coffee in her arms, but it wasn't actually that long before she was climbing the stairs and balancing the bag of pastries on top of her coffee tray to punch in the security code on the front door. The house was completely silent when she walked in, empty of most of the equipment that had been there just a few hours before. The crew must have worked through the night to dismantle everything, and Lily felt a rush of appreciation for them — she couldn't imagine working on that little sleep and packing up hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of equipment.

She left her bag by the front door before she walked into the kitchen, hoping that someone was just sitting in there silently, but, when she rounded the corner, there wasn't anyone there, either. She set her coffee tray down onto the table, grabbed two coffees and the pastry bag, and headed back towards the stairs.

She'd seen James in the early morning a few times before, dealt with him when he basically turned into a zombie because she dared to wake him up before eight, but she'd never had to work with him when he was (probably) hungover _and_ running on about four hours sleep.

Needless to say, she was pretty sure that it was going to be a complete fucking nightmare as she knocked on the door and walked into James' room.

James — Lily had to stifle a laugh — James was laying sprawled over the entirety of his bed. His head was half shoved under a pillow, one of his legs was dangling over the edge of the bed nearest her, and the rest of him was twisted, literally, inside his topsheet.

She sighed, crossed the room and set James' coffee and pastry bag onto the remaining free space on the bedside table (took a sip of hers to brace herself for what was coming), and said, as loudly as she could without actually yelling, 'James!'

He didn't move. Didn't even make a sound.

She took another sip of coffee.

'James!' This time she nudged the edge of the bed with her knee, hoping that the slight motion would jolt something in him awake.

Nothing.

Apparently, she was going to have to take more direct action if she was going to be waking him up early in the morning after late shoots.

She shifted her arm so that she was holding her coffee well away from the bed and used her free hand to pull the pillow off of James' head (she had half a mind to pull the blankets off him, too, but he was far too twisted up in them for her to even begin to figure out how to do that successfully). James, finally, groaned at the light hitting his eyes and turned his head so that it was pressed into the mattress.

'No,' Lily reached out and started pushing his shoulder so that he would turn to face her. 'You have to wake up, James. Come on, I brought coffee.'

'I don't want coffee.' He'd let her push him up onto his side, but the moment he finished speaking, he turned towards the bed again, and he was too heavy for her to really stop him with one hand.

'James! Get up, we're going to be late.'

He groaned again into the bed.

'Look,' she was getting impatient now, 'I know you don't want to get up, but I don't care. I didn't want to get up, and yet _here I am._ So you can get the fuck up and drink the coffee I brought you and have a fucking pastry, and you can stop your bloody whinging because I'm not here for that today!'

James groaned even louder into the mattress, but, thankfully, he started trying to untangle his legs from the blankets.

When he finally freed himself a moment later, he sat up in bed and rubbed his eyes before reaching blindly towards the table for his glasses. He nodded at her as he picked up his coffee and let his eyes fall closed again as he took a long, slow drink.

'Fuck,' he said, lowering the cup to his knee and looking up at her. 'That's delicious.'

Lily grinned. 'Right? Wait until you try that pastry.' She nodded towards the bag still sitting on the bedside table.

James hummed and took another long drag of his coffee. 'Thanks for this,' he said, setting the cup down and standing up.

Lily shrugged. 'It's nothing.'

James shook his head at her and opened his mouth like he was going to reply, but he yawned instead.

Lily decided to head back downstairs to give James space to get ready (after making it very clear to him that if she came upstairs and he was back in bed, she was going to kill him), pulled her mobile out of her back pocket as she settled in at the dining table. She had a few texts from Mary — the first of which, _thanks for letting me have an early night last night. I feel great this morning! See you in SANTORINI! X_ , made her smile — a text from Marlene that had come early the night before, and, of course, a few emails.

James walked downstairs a few minutes later, dressed, as he had been a few days before, in joggers and a t shirt. This time, though, he'd popped a baseball cap onto his head (a smart choice given how completely mad his hair had been when she'd gone upstairs to wake him). He was dragging his holdall on the ground behind him, an effort he abandoned about halfway through the kitchen as he focused instead on pulling out a chair and collapsing into his seat instead.

He took another long drink of coffee and, though it seemed like James might have been trying to suppress it so Lily didn't hear it, groaned again.

Lily didn't even try to hide her amusement.

'We've got,' she checked her watch, 'like ten minutes until the car gets here. You might want to wake up a bit more before then.'

James just shot her a look, dug his pastry out of his bag, and took a bite.

'Do you want to go over the agenda for today _now_ or do you want to wait until we land in Greece?'

James sighed, lifted his hand to cover his mouth as he spoke. 'I'm not going to remember a fucking thing right now, can it wait?'

Lily nodded, leaned back in her seat, and took another sip of coffee.

They sat in companionable silence, just drinking their coffee and listening to the muffled street sounds that were making their way through the walls, until Lily's mobile buzzed on the table to announce the car's arrival outside. By the time they were gathering up their things and heading out the door, James looked a bit more awake than he had when she'd first woken him up, but she still wasn't at all surprised when he collapsed into his seat in the back of the town car and immediately closed his eyes.

Benjy gave Lily a look when she climbed inside and closed the door. Lily laughed. 'He takes a while to wake up in the morning.'

James held his fingers up at her and Lily just laughed.

By the time they landed in Santorini a few hours later, James was back to his usually energetic self.

The airport was easily one of the smallest that Lily had ever been to — they got off the plane on the tarmac, there were only a few luggage carousels, and the whole thing felt a bit claustrophobic for the number of people currently crammed into the space.

They'd apparently chosen to fly into Santorini at the same time as five other aeroplanes, completely maxing out the airport.

They stood quietly while Benjy waited beside the luggage carousel for his bag (he'd taken his filming equipment in his carry on after an incident while they were filming the last series and he refused to put it underneath the plane since). Once they had all their bags in hand, they moved outside to wait for their car.

James turned and beamed at her as they stepped out into the sun. 'I can smell the ocean,' he said, and his smile brightened as he lifted himself up onto his toes and looked around. 'Do you think if I went down there I could see it?'

He pointed down towards the far end of the airport towards the carpark and Lily shook her head at him. 'The car is going to be here in a minute, you're not going anywhere.'

He stuck his lip out at her and Lily just laughed, shook her head. 'Beg all you want, my answer isn't going to change.'

Benjy just shook his head at the pair of them as he checked his watch.

'Car should be here in five.'

They chatted easily while they waited for the car, talked about their families back home, uni, but when the car arrived a few minutes later and they turned out of the airport onto . Firon-Ias, they found they didn't have much else to say. It wasn't lack of interest, but the words just didn't seem necessary.

The airport, perhaps, should have been some kind of indication, but Lily wasn't expecting the one lane road that they turned onto, wasn't expecting the wide, largely empty volcanic flats that seemed to make up the centre of the island. She could see the hills in the distance outside her car window, but most of the drive, save the pair of horses they saw about ten minutes in, gave her nothing too exciting to look at.

Benjy had taken the first few minutes of the drive to set up his camera equipment, had gotten a few shots of James looking out the window while Lily had been tracing the landscape, but he was sitting, now, with the camera in his lap, looking out the window. He turned when he felt Lily's eyes on him and smiled.

'Not what you expected?'

Lily shrugged. 'I think I just expected the whole island to look like it does in the travel adverts.'

Benjy chuckled and nodded. 'Nothing ever looks like it looks in the travel adverts.'

This turned out to be the case for most of the drive up to Oia, the town where they were staying for the next few days, though Lily couldn't help but get excited when, after they drove through a village in the centre of the island and started heading north, the view started to change. They were driving nearer to the coast now, the wildlife refuge that ran along the western edge of the island the only thing separating them from the ocean. Benjy directed his camera towards the view again as they drove, once the flats became cliffs and the road edged closer to the ocean. The buildings outside the window multiplied as they continued on, going from one to two buildings dotted occasionally along the horizon to groups of whitewashed buildings that eventually became crowded streets. A few kilometres outside the city, when the driver slowed down to accommodate the increased traffic (which, in all honesty, was just a few cars trying to pack themselves onto streets that were really only designed to handle one way traffic), Lily turned to look at James.

He was sitting quietly beside her, his head turned towards the window as he took in the landscape. There was a shadow of a beard along his jaw, down his throat, and the sun shining through the window was giving his golden skin a slight glow. She shouldn't be looking at him, not like this, not right now, but the more that she told herself to stop doing it, to stop thinking about him in the way she was thinking about him (about the way his biceps looked in his t shirt, the way his stubble would feel if it grazed against her skin), the more impossible it was to stop.

Benjy cleared his throat and Lily jumped, looked around — he was looking at her with a look on his face that Lily absolutely didn't like.

'What?' She'd hoped that the flush on her cheeks wasn't going to give her away, but then her voice had cracked and she knew that she was screwed.

Benjy just looked at her a moment, his gaze holding hers, like he was trying to figure something out. After a long moment, he shook his head. 'Nothing.'

When they pulled up in front of the villa fifteen minutes later, Lily had managed to get herself under control (though she didn't miss the way that Benjy was watching her a bit more closely than he usually did as they moved to gather their bags). They walked up the small drive, through the blue wooden gate that led onto the small patio just off the kitchen and into the house. She was surprised at how light the interior was, how the crisp white walls and ceiling made the house look even more open than it already was. The spaces themselves weren't large (Lily knew that it would have been difficult to set up a bunch of filming equipment here and she was glad that most of their filming in the villa would be limited to Benjy and maybe two or three other cameras at the most — even the lights the crew had set up throughout the house before they'd arrived were a bit much), but they were enough for what they needed them for, and, really, the views were what they'd been after when they'd booked this place. The house was set on top of the hill, and the patio off the kitchen gave them a gorgeous view of the houses below, the sea, and the hills across the way. There was a balcony set off the bedroom, too, that she remembered from the photos when they'd booked the place a few months back, and she was sure that the view there would be equally amazing.

'Evans,' James turned and looked at her as she and Benjy set their bags on the floor in the lounge. 'This place is… it's stunning.'

She smiled at him as she passed him a mic pack from Benjy's bag. 'You know that we're only going to book the best.'

James set his bag down to hook the pack onto the back of his joggers, maneuvered carefully to feed the microphone wire through his shirt. It took him a minute and a bit of frustrated huffing, but eventually, he looked up at her and grinned.

'I think I'm getting better at this.'

Lily laughed and nodded at him before she turned to Benjy. He was still clicking together the pieces of his steadicam holster — 'You need a few before we head upstairs?'

Benjy nodded. 'Just a minute or two. I'm going to walk through and check the lighting and then we can head up and get some of that footage.'

'It looks like we might not need to turn on too many of these,' she said, nodding her head at the lights placed strategically throughout the first floor.

'No,' Benjy shook his head, 'I think the natural light will get us through most of the house, but I'll probably still need a few on to make sure the lighting is even.'

James had wandered off while they chatted, gone back out onto the balcony to have a look. Lily could see him leaning over the edge of the wall, his weight resting heavily on his forearms, his t shirt stretching over the muscles in his back.

Benjy cleared his throat again and Lily turned to look at him.

He was smiling knowingly at her and she frowned at him. 'What?'

'I think you know what,' he said, raising an eyebrow at her as he strapped his holster to his chest.

'I have no idea what you're talking about.'

'Lily,' he deadpanned and she sighed.

'He's just fit. Am I not allowed to admire that?'

'You are,' Benjy said, his tone carefully even, 'but I've seen how you look at people you thought were fit before, and that look on your face isn't it.'

Lily rolled her eyes. 'When have you seen me looking at anyone I thought was fit?'

Benjy shot her a look. 'Remember that French guy you met last year when we went out to the pub after we wrapped? Or the guy that you were talking to while we were in India because "he knew a lot of cool local places we should film"?'

Lily laughed and nudged his foot with hers. 'How about you shut up now, please.'

Benjy grinned at her. 'I'm just saying, Lil, I know what that looks like. This is definitely not it.'

'You and Marlene,' Lily mumbled.

It probably wasn't the best idea to let Benjy know that he was alone in his suspicions (though how she could honestly call them suspicions when she knew them to be true was beyond her), but the words had slipped out of her mouth before she'd thought better of it. She'd hoped that the fact that she'd mumbled them would keep Benjy from properly hearing them, but the look on his face told her that he'd heard her perfectly well.

'I'm glad to know that Marlene agrees with me.'

'Only because you want to be right.'

Benjy laughed again. 'Yeah, I do. But it's also nice to know that she's probably going to be pushing you on this, too.'

'"Pushing me"? Pushing me to do what?'

'I mean, Lil, you've got to tell him, haven't you?'

'What? Benjy, no, I haven't. That makes no sense —'

'What makes no sense?'

Lily whipped around and found James standing opposite them just inside the open archway into the kitchen. She shook her head.

'Benjy was just talking nonsense, that's all.'

'Oh?' James walked into the room and settled himself on the couch opposite where Lily and Benjy were standing. 'What about?'

Benjy gave Lily a wry smile as he hooked his camera into the holster and turned it on. 'I'm going to go test the lighting. You two don't go disappearing on me.'

She hated him. She hated Benjy Fenwick and she was going to push him off a cliff and into the sea at the first available opportunity.

Lily sat down on the couch behind her, facing James, as Benjy walked out of the room, smirk still planted firmly on his face. James raised an eyebrow at her.

'You two are being weird.'

Lily sighed, ran a hand through her hair to brush the strands out of her eyes. 'Fen's just being an idiot,' she said. 'He was reminding me about the few times last year we went abroad and I made an idiot of myself.'

She'd hoped that giving him _part_ of the truth would make it easier to brush it off, but she hadn't accounted for the fact that James was, apparently, very interested in hearing about her life.

'Oh?' James' lips stretched into a smile as he leaned back onto the sofa, crossed one leg over the other. 'Do tell.'

Fuck.

She shook her head. 'It's nothing, really.' She tried to make her tone as dismissive as possible, to make it sound like Benjy was just being ridiculous in hopes that James would just give up asking her about it. 'We just met a few people while shooting last year and I thought they were fit. He likes to remind me of it whenever he needs a laugh.'

James nodded, and though he was still smiling, Lily didn't miss the way that it lost a bit of its luster. 'Why's that funny?'

Lily shook her head, laughed a bit to lighten the tension that had suddenly formed between them. 'God knows.'

They sat quietly for a few minutes, the air between them thick with something that LIly couldn't quite interpret. It was unexpected, this feeling, and though she knew why it was awkward on her end, she wasn't sure why James was sitting there like he was.

'Alright,' she said, clearing her throat and shifting a bit in her seat to pull her mobile out of her pocket. 'Are you ready to go over your schedule now? We might as well do something instead of just sitting here.'

James nodded as he shifted in his seat, straightened his legs out in front of him. 'Yeah, alright.'

'We're going to be here until the seventh, so we'll have a fair few days to explore —'

'Does that mean we'll get to actually walk around a little bit? Actually see the place?'

'I'm… sure we could find an excuse or two to leave the villa when we aren't filming.' She was careful to word it so that it didn't sound like a definite promise, but when she saw James' features brighten, she knew that she was going to find a way to make it happen (even if it meant begging Benjy to go get some shots somewhere... again).

'You'll be out and about a bit more here anyway,' Lily continued. 'There are a few outdoor dates here, so you'll get to walk around outside and see a bit more of the place than you did in Rome.'

'So what's the schedule look like?'

'We haven't got anything formal on the calendar for the rest of the day today — we'll need to walk around and get some shots of you by the water, talk about the experience so far, that kind of thing, so we'll work on that today.

'Tomorrow and Wednesday we have the group dates scheduled, so you'll need to pick nine women for each of those dates. Tuesday is your one-on-one, so let me know who you'd like to take and I'll coordinate.'

James nodded. 'Is there a deadline that you need those by?'

'I just need to know the one on one by tomorrow night so that we can get the note over to the villa where the contestants are staying and I can coordinate with her producer. She's really the only one you need to pick, we can just divide the remaining contestants evenly if that's easier.'

James nodded again, but he had a bit of a frown on his face this time, a crease in his eyebrows that Lily didn't miss. She was just about to open her mouth to say something else when James looked back up at her.

'I'd like to take Liza on the dinner date,' he said, and his cheeks flushed just enough that Lily noticed. 'We can talk about dividing the remaining contestants up when we get back from doing shoots tonight?'

Lily nodded, tried to ignore the way that her stomach was now twisting in on itself. It didn't matter that he clearly had someone he liked already, that was the _point_ of this whole fucking thing, and her feelings for him were entirely inappropriate anyway.

They weren't even feelings, she was just attracted to him. And honestly, looking at him, who wouldn't be? It was just something that she was going to need to get over.

She looked over and found James fiddling aimlessly with the wire of his microphone, sitting up every once and a while to reach behind and, from the way it looked, check that his micpack was, indeed, off. He was still so nervous about so much of this — it was easy to forget when they were off camera and he was his usual self, when he was light and easy and emphatic. He was doing much better than he had in Rome, sitting in this villa with at least the outward appearance of calm, but when Lily let herself watch him, it wasn't difficult to miss the little signs that he was still at least a bit uncomfortable.

'Hey,' James looked up at her when she spoke, and Lily smiled at him. 'Want to hear something hilarious?'

When Benjy walked in a few minutes later, James and Lily were both doubled over in laughter as she recounted a story about her and her friend Sarah from school. Benjy leaned up against the archway as he watched them, eyebrow raised as they attempted to get a handle on themselves, but then James gasped out, 'In the fucking throat,' and they both started roaring with laughter again.

By the time they managed to finally control themselves long enough to stand and James had time to go up into his room and get his things unpacked, it was early evening. James rested his hand dramatically on his stomach as Lily was explaining that they were going to go get some footage of him walking through the village and she cut off.

'What?' She looked pointedly at his hand.

James groaned and ran his hand over his stomach. 'I'm going to die if I don't eat something soon.'

'I — James, no you are not.'

'I might, Evans. I might.'

She turned to Benjy, who, to Lily's annoyance, was still eyeing them with that look on his face.

'Have you heard from anyone today?'

He shook his head. 'Cal texted me when we were at the airport to let me know they'd finished installing these lights,' he tipped his head towards the lights dotted around the ceiling, 'but I haven't heard anything else. I think Ben said they were having some issues with the contestant house, so I think everyone might be over there.'

Lily hummed her acknowledgment, nodded slowly. She had half a mind to be annoyed about the fact that no one seemed to think it was a good idea to fucking communicate what was going on across production, but she already spent too much time being annoyed on this show.

'Do you think we could head out for a bit, get some shots of him outside?' She tipped her heads towards James, who scoffed.

'I'm right here —'

'Yeah,' Benjy nodded. 'Weather looked great on the drive up, I think we could manage it.'

They gathered up their things (James still muttering under his breath about how he couldn't believe they were talking about him right in front of him like he wasn't even there), and headed out towards the village centre.

They managed to get some absolutely brilliant shots — James looking out over the sea, rows and rows of whitewashed buildings behind him, James walking by the small, open air shops along the main road, laughing with the people who worked there. Some of her favourite shots, though, were the ones that Lily knew they'd cut — James turning around to smile at her because of something she'd said, walking backwards, wide smile on his face, as he did his best to maintain a conversation with Lily who was still determinedly remaining out of frame.

The sun in this place seemed to bring out the best in him. It made his eyes shine brighter, made his tan skin almost golden, made his smile seem wider, easier. There was no way, looking at him as she was now, that he was going to be anything but beloved on this show.

After two hours of wandering around and filming what they could, Lily finally agreed to let them stop and get food.

They'd spotted a small gyro place just off the main road about an hour before, and as they hadn't gone too far in the hour since, Lily decided that they would make the trek back up the hill to get dinner.

'I'll just wait here for you guys,' Benjy said. He sat down on the low wall lining the road, detached the camera arm and set it a bit haphazardly at his feet.

Lily frowned. 'You don't want to come?'

Benjy shook his head. 'I need a break from carrying this shit around. My back is fucking killing me.'

'Do you want us to bring you back something?'

Benjy waved her off. 'No, I'm fine. I'm not hungry anyway.'

Lily studied him for a moment, her brow furrowed.

'You really don't want anything?'

Benjy shook his head. 'I'm alright, Lil. I ate a fucking ton back at the airport, remember?'

Lily raised an eyebrow at him. 'That was hours ago.'

'Yeah,' Benjy reached underneath his camera vest. 'And I still don't fucking feel right.'

'Alright,' Lily said, her tone a bit hesitant. 'Well, we'll be back, then.'

'No need to hurry back. I'll be here whenever you two turn up again.'

Benjy's lip twitched. Lily pretended she hadn't noticed.

'Shouldn't be more than half an hour,' she said.

'Like I said,' Benjy grinned at her as he leaned back, pulled his mobile out of his pocket. 'No rush. I'm gonna call the wife, anyway.'

Lily brightened. 'Tell V I say hi.'

'Will do.'

Benjy unlocked his phone as James and Lily turned away and started up the road towards the hill.

'So,' Lily turned to look at James as they rounded the corner, 'how're you liking the show so far?'

'I'm enjoying it,' he said. He paused, reached his arm behind him and unplugged his microphone before he continued. 'It's only been, like, two days, but so far so good.'

'Anyone in particular you like? Anyone that stands out?'

He was quiet for a moment before he cleared his throat. 'Liza seems cool,' he said. 'Summer is nice, too.'

Lily nodded slowly.

It was a little like torture, trying to get this from him, to figure out where his head was at. He'd only known these women for a day, so it wasn't likely that he was really going to have _any_ opinions on anyone yet, but he was going to have first impressions.

'Yeah, they seem cool.'

'Look,' James stopped midway up the hill and turned to look at her. 'Can we talk about something else? Please?' He sounded exhausted, looked exhausted, but his tone wasn't unkind. Though Lily happily changed the subject, she didn't let it go unnoticed that he wasn't feeling up to sharing.

'Sure.' They continued up the hill and she thought for a moment before she turned and smiled at him. 'Tell me more about Sirius?'

James laughed. 'It's always Sirius with you.'

Lily nudged him with her elbow. 'He just seems like a character. Him and your mother.'

James shook his head, but the smile on his face was the brightest she'd seen since they'd left England.

'They're just louder about it. Dad and Remus are the real troublemakers because you never expect it of them.'

Lily raised an amused eyebrow at him. 'Wouldn't you start to expect it once they'd done it a few times?'

James shot her a look. 'You really don't know Dad and Remus.'

Lily laughed. 'So tell me about them, then.'

He did.

Lily watched as James' exhausted expression lightened, couldn't hold back her smile when he started grinning at her as he recalled the finer details of the stories he was telling. She loved listening to James tell stories — he brought them alive, made her feel like she'd really been there, managed to somehow always get her invested to a truly absurd degree — but it was always that much more powerful when he was talking about his family. He got this intensity about him, and you could tell that he loved these people more than anything else in the world, that he would do absolutely anything for them.

'So poor Dad, right?' James was saying. His smile was infectious and Lily couldn't help but smile right back.

'Well, Dad goes to Remus — because Remus is a fucking mastermind, Evans, he'll try to pretend otherwise and look all innocent, but he's a _genius._ He hid cabbage in my room once, for _months_ — drove me completely mad. But anyway —'

'Wait, wait, wait,' Lily was nearly doubled over with laughter. 'He hid cabbage in your room?'

James gave her a serious look. 'We'll get there, Evans. Trust me. You need to hear about how my father betrayed me first.'

Lily snorted. 'Alright, carry on.'

'So it started slowly at first — it always does with those two, Evans, it's why they're so good. Sirius and Mum and I always go too big right from the beginning and so it's just so fucking obvious. But Dad and Remus start slow.

'So, my room has basically been a Chelsea shrine since I was like, six.' He looks at her like this is the most obvious fact in the world, and even though, in a way, she supposes it is, it still makes her laugh.

'Like posters on the walls, figurines of my favourite players, a fucking duvet — the whole nine. I was _invested._ Now, I only have Dad and Remus' word about when this started because, as I said, I didn't notice for like, two weeks. _Apparently,_ they started with my figurines — took them one at a time off my shelves and replaced them,' he puts a dramatic hand to his chest, as though the next words out of his mouth are about the pain him, 'with Arsenal figurines.'

Lily immediately burst out laughing but James held up a hand, shook his head at her. 'This isn't funny, Evans, this was traumatic for me.'

Lily, though, can't get it together — her vague attempt at smoothing out her features was completely ineffective and James gave her a look before he continued.

'So I don't notice at first, right, because they put them in the same exact place on the shelf and I was fifteen, it wasn't like I was looking at them every day, you know? I don't notice what they're up to until I come home from school one day and my Hasselbaink poster has been _replaced_ with a fucking _Henry_ poster.'

Despite not having the faintest idea what he was talking about, Lily gasped dramatically. James nodded in agreement.

'I know. They probably should have waited to change that one, started with Desailly or de Goey or someone that I didn't look at every day because, and you can make fun of me all you want, Evans,' Lily hastily rearranged her features but James still raised a knowing eyebrow at her. 'I looked at that Hasselbaink poster every bloody day. I wanted to _be_ that man.'

He fell quiet for a minute.

'So, I go downstairs and grab the phone and dial my father's office, and _of course,_ he answers on the first ring. Now, he's all innocent sounding, like "Well, hello there, James, did you have a good day at school, how was practice," and I am just not having it. He denies having the even slightest idea what I'm talking about, tells me that I probably need to go get my eyes checked again because he's a horrible, horrible father.'

Lily snorted and James shot her a look.

'I'll pretend that you aren't finding this amusing, Evans, because it would hurt me too much to think that you were enjoying my pain.'

Lily laughed out loud then, and James smiled in spite of himself.

'So over the next few days, my other posters start getting replaced. Desailly comes down, de Goey, Guðjohnsen, and then, they took it to the next level.'

He paused for effect, shook his head with grave seriousness.

'Lily, one day,' he pressed his hand to his mouth and Lily almost couldn't keep it together.

'One day, about a week later, I came home and my Chelsea blue duvet and sheet set,' James ignored the fact that Lily had completely dissolved into laughter again, 'had been replaced with a bright red duvet that had Arsenal's crest on it, and Evans,' she was still laughing, and though Lily could see the ghost of a smile on his face as he watched her, he managed to keep his features even.

'Evans, you have no idea how much that hurt.'

'How did you get all your stuff back?' She could barely get the words out because she was laughing so hard and James shook his head at her.

'I don't think you're really appreciating how upsetting this was for me.'

She waved her hand over her face in a half-hearted attempt to settle herself down and said, 'Sorry, sorry, sorry.'

She stopped laughing, mostly, but she still had an amused grin on her face that she couldn't seem to erase. James, apparently deciding that she wasn't going to give this story the treatment it deserved, just carried on.

'So, I go downstairs, and those traitors are sitting on the couch, and I have no idea where Remus came from because he wasn't there when I get home, but fucking dad probably called him or something — I still don't know. But anyway — they're sitting there, looking all innocent like the liars they are, and I go — here, I'll act it out for you — I go, "Dad, where's all my stuff?" and he _looks me in the eye_ and says "What stuff, James?"'

He switched his voice to a slightly deeper, clearly mocking tone, and Lily burst into laughter again.

'I'm sure your father doesn't sound like that.'

'He does, Evans, I assure you. So he's like, "I don't know what you're talking about" and I'm like "yes you fucking do and we both know it," and so we go back and forth for a little while, and you would think that Remus, my _best friend,_ would have cracked at some point and been like, "James, they're in the garage, let's go get them," but you would be wrong, Evans, you would be _wrong._

'Remus just sits there, _dead silent,_ and watches it all happen. So I turn to him and go, "Remus, my best friend, help me out," and Remus just looks at me, steady as always, and goes, "Help you with what?" Evans, I almost lost it.'

'How did you end up getting your stuff back?'

'I'm getting there! So we go around like this for, and I'm not kidding, like literally an hour. Finally, _finally,_ Mum comes in and she goes, "Fleamont! Stop torturing the poor boy" and I'm about ready to thank her but then she goes, "I'm tired of hearing about it," so basically no one in my family loves me.'

She snorted, nudged her elbow against his. 'You're an idiot. Where was all your stuff?'

'In the attic! Dad knew I would never go up there, so that was the best place to hide it.'

Lily raised an eyebrow at him. 'Why wouldn't you go into the attic?'

James shrugged, but there's a look about him that Lily feels like she can just read. It's not entirely clear, but she has an inkling.

'Were you afraid of your attic?'

'No!'

They continued bickering the rest of the walk to the restaurant. When they reached it, high on the top of the hill overlooking the village, LIly's calves ached and she was more out of breath than she'd like to admit (especially because James didn't look like he'd even broken a sweat).

The restaurant was a small, light beige house with a few very small bar tables out front. There was a low wall that ran alongside the pavement, and though there were hinges on the inside of the gap in the wall, the gate that had been there must have been removed. There were a few people clustered outside eating, a few sitting on the bar stools, most just lingering around on the stone patio, and even from this distance, Lily could see the crowd of people waiting just inside the restaurant door.

They walked through the gate and up the narrow stone walkway towards the door. The space was small, a thin wooden counter separating the narrow walkway from the kitchen area behind. There were a few people lingering around the edges of the walk towards the till, but Lily couldn't quite tell if they were waiting to order or if they were waiting on their food. She looked at a few people standing along the wall, and as no one seemed like they were reading the menu board hanging on the wall opposite, Lily decided that they were (probably) just waiting on their food.

Her queue anxiety, though, soon dissolved when James turned to her, wide smile on his face.

'They have kebab!'

'James,' Lily rolled her eyes at him. 'We didn't come all the way from Greece for you to eat exactly like you do at home.'

'This is a _Greek_ kebab, Evans. It's totally different!'

She snorted and James sighed. 'Fine. I'll get the kebab next time.'

'Who said there's going to be a next time?'

James just smiled at her as he stepped up to the counter.

They met Benjy about twenty minutes later, still sitting on the wall where they'd left him.

They couldn't film James while he was eating (because of some bizarre rule that Peter had implemented last year), so they sat down on the wall beside Benjy, being careful not to knock his camera off onto the ground. It was hot, between the sun beating down on her face and her ill-advised outfit that consisted of mostly dark clothing it was nearly unbearable, but there was a steady breeze blowing off the water, her gyro was the most delicious thing she'd ever eaten, and, for the first time since filming started, she was getting to talk to James properly again.

He turned and smiled at her as he sat down before looking back out at the sea, leaning back on his arm so that he was turned a bit towards her.

They chatted easily, her and James and Benjy — they swapped more uni stories, James told them about some of the craziest things he'd seen (and a few that he'd done) while travelling around playing football, they talked about their families. It was nice, sitting here like this — she could almost forget what they were here for, could forget that they weren't just enjoying an easy holiday together.

She knew that tomorrow everything would kick off again, knew that she'd spend the next four days running around like a maniac to make sure that James got to every date in one piece, that James remembered everyone's names, that she got in all the shots they needed to get of James doing one thing or another, but right now, sitting here on this wall and feeling the salty air against her skin — right now, she could pretend that none of that was hovering just beyond the horizon.

James and Benjy had fallen silent, and Lily turned to look at them in case they were waiting on her to reply to something she hadn't heard. Benjy, though, was fiddling with his mobile and James was looking out at the sea, a contemplative expression on his face. She was just getting ready to turn away when James looked at her.

She should have known, then, that the things she occasionally felt for James were too much for her to manage. Should have known, when his eyes moved slowly over her face, lingering for a moment on her lips, that she wasn't alone in feeling whatever this was.

James smiled at her then, a softer smile than the ones she was used to, quieter, but it was warmer, too, more intimate. James smiled at her and, after she let his gaze linger over her face for another moment, she turned and looked back out at the sea.


	16. Chapter 15

**I am so easy to peer pressure.**

 **Also, you have scaredofrobots to thank for like, this entire chapter. She is also a peer pressuring genius and I love her**

* * *

Knowing that her life was about to become a complete and total shit show, apparently, didn't make it any easier for her to deal with.

It was late morning the next day. They'd spent the morning driving back down the island (why they couldn't have just stayed down there was beyond her, but Peter had insisted on Oia) to the beach where they were having their first group date of the series, an incredibly cliché, incredibly awkward "Grecian Games" that Lily had tried and failed to kill.

And now, because her past self had failed so spectacularly, her present self was having to fight with James in a beach changing tent because he was refusing to put on this fucking costume Peter had "suggested" they all wear. James had looked at her like she was completely mad when she first handed him the strip ( _strip_ ) of white fabric that they were passing off as an outfit, but mad or not, she really needed him to just put the damn thing on already because they were going to be late and she was rapidly nearing the end of her rope.

Peter would also have her head if she didn't manage it and then probably spend a disproportionate amount of his time thinking of far worse ways to torture them from then on.

She'd seen it enough last year with poor Reza, one of the other producers — he never followed Peter's stupid directions and Peter made his life a living hell. He quit the moment they wrapped.

'Come on, James,' she smiled encouragingly at him and did her best to look like she was believing the things she was saying. 'It'll be fun!'

James raised an eyebrow at her. 'Evans, I'm going to look ridiculous.'

Lily bit the corner of her lip. 'That's part of the fun?'

James groaned, 'For you, maybe,' and Lily burst immediately into laugher. She tried her best to smother it, but the more she tried to get a handle on herself, the more she laughed.

James' scowl deepened.

'Alright, look,' she took a deep breath to try and steady herself. 'Look, you don't _have_ to wear the toga, but everyone else will be wearing these things, so….'

James sighed and reached out to take the toga from her hand.

'Fine,' he said, frowning at her as Lily suppressed a smile. 'But know that I don't like it and that I'm extremely cross with you.'

Lily was all set to start laughing at him again, but then he reached down and tugged his t shirt over his head.

She quickly busied herself with her radio.

As soon as James finished changing, they made their way down to the beach, James tugging anxiously at the hem of his toga as they started across the sand.

'James,' Lily turned her head up to look at him, squinting through the sun. 'You look fine. Relax.'

'I can't. I'm basically naked.'

Lily rolled her eyes. 'You are not naked.'

He gestured down at himself, an incredulous look on his face. 'Look at me.'

She'd been trying not to.

Whoever had picked this out certainly knew exactly what they were doing, loathe though Lily was to admit it. The crisp white fabric contrasted beautifully with James' warm, brown skin, and the cut — the cut made Lily think some incredibly indecent things.

The thick band of fabric across his chest was longer than strictly necessary, ensuring that his chest and upper abdominals were clearly in view. The top piece widened towards his waist and flowed into a skirt that was just ( _just_ ) long enough to cover the important bits. It hit right in the centre of his quads, and Lily didn't think that muscles were her thing, but holy shit was she wrong.

It was going to take a truly momentous amount of effort to stop thinking about how badly she wanted to run her hands over him now.

She glanced at him for a moment, just long enough to appease him before she turned her gaze back up to his face. 'You look great, James. Relax.'

He still seemed anxious, though, and so Lily did the only thing that she could think of to distract him and get things back on track.

'Favourite movie not released in the last ten years. Go.'

'Wh — hold on, Evans, you can't just drop in something like that, this is serious.'

Lily ignored him. 'Mine is — well I have three.'

'You can't have three!'

'Yes I can. But I asked about your favourite, so go on.'

James heaved a sigh. 'Well it depends on the time of year —'

Lily felt the smile starting to tug at her cheeks.

'I — don't you dare make fun of me for what I'm about to say.'

Lily put her hand to her chest. 'I swear.'

'Well, okay, so when I was growing up, Mum really liked to watch all those Hugh Grant films —'

'Oh my god.'

' — and so I ended up watching a ton of them with her and I think that — well, I can't choose, actually — but I think that _Four Weddings and a Funeral_ might be my favourite. Though I — nevermind.'

Lily nudged his elbow lightly with hers. 'What? Tell me!'

'You'll laugh.'

'I'm not laughing right now, am I? _Four Weddings and a Funeral_ is a fucking brilliant film. And Hugh Grant is just —' She fanned herself and James snorted.

'You're ridiculous.'

'Yes. Now tell me your other favourite. Please.'

'I —' he heaved a sigh. 'I quite like _Bridget Jones_.'

'Me too! What's your favourite bit?!'

James laughed. 'Am I the most cliché if I say that the ending is my favourite bit?'

'Yes,' Lily nodded, 'but it's also just — insufferably romantic of you, so I guess it fits.'

Fuck. Why words come out of her mouth without passing through her brain first —

James looked down at her, a cheeky smirk on his face. 'Oh? And why's that?'

Double fuck.

Lily cleared her throat and looked away. 'So anyway, I have three favourites.'

She saw James raise his eyebrows at her out of the corner of her eye. 'Evans.'

She was just going to ignore him until he stopped looking at her like that. They were not going down this road today, thank you very much, and she didn't need to give herself the opportunity to say anything else stupid.

' _Holy Grail_ , because — I mean, come on, how is that movie not the most fucking amazing thing to ever exist? But I also love _Jurassic Park_ , though it's possible that's largely because of Jeff Goldblum —'

'Understandable,' James said, nodding. 'When he's leaning on that cart while he's all cut up?'

Lily nodded fervently. 'And that whole, "tiny imperfections in your hand" thing — I mean, _jesus._ And also _Indiana Jones_. That movie totally got me hot.'

James snorted. ' _Indiana Jones_ got you hot?'

'YES! Have you _seen_ Harrison Ford?'

'Isn't he like, eighty now?'

'He wasn't then and that's what counts.'

James shook his head at her. 'So what's your favourite Indiana Jones movie?'

Lily gave him a look. ' _Raiders of the Lost Arc_ , obviously. _Last Crusade_ is alright, but _Raiders of the Lost Arc_ — nothing beats that fucking movie.'

'Oh, I don't know,' James said, and he gave her a look then that she should have known spelt trouble. 'I was rather fond of the _Crystal Skull_.'

'YOU WERE FUCKING NOT!'

James immediately started laughing, but Lily shook her head at him. 'James — _James._ Tell me you're joking.'

'What if I'm not?'

'JAMES!'

He just laughed again.

'Okay, look,' Lily said, 'that movie was _terrible_ and I need you to accept that. It was wretched and never should have made it through production.'

'Well, I don't know,' James looked like he was teetering on the edge of laughter again, and she _knew_ he was just having her on, but she couldn't — what if _believed_ this?

'Everyone always gets angry about the alien bit,' she could _hear_ the laughter in his voice but it didn't stop her blood boiling, 'but that is the legend around the crystal skulls, right?'

'James, no! I — _ugh_.' She raked a hand through her hair. 'Some people might believe that it was some kind of alien thing, but one, _no,_ and two, there is this whole other issue about that, right, about how we're basically denying that ancient non-Western civilisations were capable of developing and using advanced technologies. Like, oh, there's no way they would know what they were doing because they weren't European, _must have been aliens because obviously that's the logical conclusion._

'And even if we take away all of that, the movie itself is still just — I mean, Shia LaBeouf?! The only good thing about Shia LaBeouf is that song that came out about him a few years ago and he was only in that for like three seconds in the end!'

When she looked over at him, mid-insane gesticulation, James was watching her with an expression on his face that made her heart climb into her throat. He looked amused — he always looked bloody amused — but there was something else there, too, something about the softness of his eyes as he looked down at her. There was a weight there, a depth, and she couldn't put her finger on it exactly, but she could feel it against her skin and it was making her very aware of herself.

He shouldn't be looking at her like that. It was going to her head. It was going to her head and she was going to do something completely foolish.

'What?' She'd meant to snap at him, but her voice came out softer, quieter than she'd intended.

James looked at her a moment longer before his expression lightened and he grinned at her.

'Nothing, Evans. Just thinking about how wrong you are.'

They bickered the rest of the walk over to where they were going to be filming that afternoon, a wide, roped off section of beach as far from the road as it was physically possible for them to get. Lily nudged James as they got closer and reminded him to turn his microphone on. He was still adjusting the pack to make sure it was under the strap of fabric on his lower back when Mary darted over to them and smiled at Lily.

'Contestants should be here shortly,' Mary's tone was light and brisk, and Lily was sure that she'd had one too many coffees that morning. 'I've got suncream and protein bars and some satsumas in my bag,' she pointed at a bag on her hip and rattled on.

'Jax said we're going to get started once the contestants get here, but I don't know if you know,' she looked at James, 'what the games are going to be for today or?'

Mary was trying and failing to keep her eyes off of James' chest and Lily had never felt another person's struggle so viscerally.

Lily smiled at her. 'Thanks, Mary. We got your email with the breakdown on the drive over, so I let James read it through in the car.'

Mary nodded, relieved, and James shot them both a grin. 'I still don't know how I'm supposed to do most of this without looking completely foolish.'

It would be so easy to tease him for that, but Lily chose to ignore him. 'We have a medic on site right? Just in case?'

Mary nodded as she whirled around and started scanning the crowd of people on the beach. She pointed a few metres away to a man chatting with one of the cameramen.

'That's him,' Mary said, whirling around to face Lily again. 'David I think? I don't remember, but he's here just in case.'

'What do you think is going to happen?' James' tone sounded casual, but the slight crease in his forehead told Lily he was genuinely concerned.

Mary waved her hand. 'Nothing's going to happen! We just have to have one everywhere in case one of you trips and bashes your head on a rock or something.'

Lily pretended not to notice James surreptitiously scanning their bit of beach for any rocks or other potentially head-bashing hazards.

'There's a coolbox over there,' Mary pointed to the row of chairs towards the far end of the beach, 'with water and stuff. And I think Mal said that Kate said that there are snacks here somewhere, but I haven't seen them anywhere, so I think it's just the stuff I have in my bag if you get hungry.'

Lily frowned. 'They should have something out here if people are going to be running around in the heat.'

Mary shrugged. 'You know how these people are.'

Lily's frown deepened. 'Yeah, I do.'

The contestants arrived a few minutes later, a pack of chattering, toga-clad women making their way across the beach. Despite the fact that everyone on this date now looked like they were going to some ridiculous university party, Lily was glad to see that the contestants were at least in sandals. She wouldn't have put it past Peter to insist that they all wore heels (especially after the track-and-field date from last year where he'd done exactly that).

Gemma, one of the contestants from… London (Lily really couldn't remember) was leading the group, and she smiled and waved at James as they approached.

'Hey,' she said. 'Nice outfit, James!'

James turned and gave Lily a brief look and she laughed. 'Go on.'

'We're going to have words about this later, Evans.' James stepped towards the crowd of contestants, turned on his heel so he could watch Lily's expression.

She laughed again. 'Looking forward to it.'

James shook his head at her, turned, and strode across the sand.

He was immediately swarmed — it took him a minute to greet everyone and for Jax's shouting about getting set up to finally sink in. James eventually made his way to the outer edge of the group and took a few large steps backward across the sand. He turned and looked at Lily over his shoulder, a look on his face that Lily couldn't quite interpret. It was there for the briefest of moments before he replaced it with an easy smile, but Lily hadn't missed it.

He turned to face the contestants again.

'Hi everyone!' Lily could tell from his voice that he was positively beaming at them.

'Hi, James!'

'Welcome to Perissa Beach! Today, I thought it would be fun to get dressed up a bit and come down here to do our own little Olympic Games!'

The contestants made enthusiastic, happy sounds, save a few in the back that looked like they'd rather be anywhere else. Lily started scrolling through her phone list to make note of who they were — she didn't need to know _as_ much about the contestants as she had done last year (where she was responsible for taking the annoyed and bitter ones and throwing them into situations that would make them snap on camera), but it couldn't hurt to know which women were less enthused about the things they were getting up to on this show.

If nothing else, it could help her give James an idea of who needed to go home every week. Disinterested and detached people are only interesting to watch for so long.

'We won't be doing any boxing, but we will compete in a version of the real events they would've held in Ancient Greece. So we'll break you up into teams —'

'Who gets to be on your team?' Rachel interrupted, and a few of the women around her chuckled. Others tried to look as though they were annoyed at the interruption, but it was clear from the weight of the attention they shifted to James that they were interested in his answer.

'I'll be rotating through,' he said, 'so I'll be on everyone's team at least once.'

There was a bit of grumbling at that, but not enough that James really noticed as they re-set and started breaking the contestants out into groups.

He did notice, though, once Laura started complaining about having Summer on her team.

'How are we supposed to win with _her_ on our team?' Laura wasn't even bothering to keep her voice down and Lily saw the hurt flash in Summer's eyes. It was brief, though, because the next moment, Summer had straightened up, squared her shoulders, and sent Laura a bright, beaming smile.

'Well, I'm just gonna do my very best.'

Laura looked like she was going to be sick.

'How's it going over here?' James strolled over as smoothly as he could, an effect slightly hampered by the fact that he was crossing sand. Lily bit back a smile.

'Hi, James,' Laura grinned at him. 'Things are going great. Summer and I were just talking strategy.'

James looked at Summer and raised his eyebrows. Summer sent him an easy smile.

'Everything's fine.'

James nodded slowly. 'Well, you let me know if you need anything.'

And though Laura said, 'Oh, we will!', James didn't turn to go until Summer nodded and smiled at him again.

The afternoon went about how Lily had expected it would. Most of the contestants seemed like they genuinely had a good time — they chatted with James when he was around and their fellow contestants when he wasn't. Other contestants, a fairly predictable list of women, were quietly competitive with one another, doing their best to out-throw or out-run the others whenever possible and making sure that their victory was brought to James' attention.

By the time they were wrapping up for the evening, everyone looked properly exhausted. A few of the contestants had slipped their sandals off and were rubbing marks out of their calves from where the rope ties had cut into their skin. Lily had taken to sitting in the sand a few hours earlier — standing had gotten to be a bit much and James hadn't needed her as often as he had during the ceremony back in Italy.

It hadn't been fun sitting there and watching James flirt his arse off, but at least she'd gotten to spend some time on a Grecian beach. And at least Mary had been there to distract her for a while (when she wasn't running around grabbing things for other people on set).

James had only come bounding over to her when Jax cut for everyone to get water. It had been fine at first, a nice little check in, but then the second time, his bronze skin had been misted with sweat and he somehow smelled amazing and she could totally see his trunks from the angle she had as she looked up at him — after that, it wasn't fine anymore. After that, it was a little bit like torture.

Once the competition piece was over, the contestants' producers moved in, started taking people over to a number of cameras they had spaced out on the opposite end of the beach to start filming their diaries. James' diaries, being the most sensitive, happened in isolation, so he was done for the day.

He watched the contestants move off with their producers, said goodbye to the women that came over to talk to him, handed out a few hugs. Lily watched Jax as James talked to them — he was violently swinging his arm at Marc, one of the new producers this year, before he finally sent one of the poor PAs (some kid that Lily was pretty sure was called Charlie) to go grab Marc and physically move him out of the way.

Jax ended up making James and Claire re-tape their goodbye, something that was as fantastically awkward as it could possibly be. It took them a few shots for it to look natural again, and by the time they were done, they were both laughing genuinely at one another.

James leaned down and said something to Claire and she looked up at him and beamed.

Lily felt like her stomach had been dissolved in acid.

James and Claire said their goodbyes and he turned towards where Lily was sitting. He smiled widely when his eyes found hers and he started across the beach. He moved like he was going to stuff his hands into his pockets as he approached and frowned at the waistband of his toga when his hands missed. Lily laughed as she got to her feet and did her best to let the sinking feeling in her gut drain away.

It was going to take longer than two seconds to get rid of it, but if she at least made a conscious effort, maybe it would be alright.

'Smooth.'

James grinned at her. 'I'm plenty smooth, Evans.'

Lily rolled her eyes, but James just ignored her. 'Where's Mary?'

Lily sighed. 'Peter called a few of the PAs back to the contestant house. Said there was a "dire emergency" that needed to be attended to.'

'Is everything alright?!'

Lily waved a hand. 'Yeah, everything's fine. Mary texted me and said that Peter needed them all to do a phone check. Apparently one of the contestants was bragging last night about getting away with having hers.'

James cringed. 'God, that sucks.'

Lily shrugged. 'Yeah, well. Don't brag about breaking the rules if you're trying to get away with it.'

Lily grabbed her radio off her hip to announce that she and James were leaving set before they turned and started making their way back across the sand.

'So, are you some kind of big rule breaker then, Evans?'

Lily frowned up at him. 'What?'

'You seem to have a decent rule breaking philosophy.'

'Oh,' Lily laughed. 'No, I'm not a big rule breaker. Only when necessary. And —'

She fell silent as she remembered — she pointed at his back and then held her hand up between them, mimed turning a dial. James nodded, reached back, and shut his mic off before he grinned at her. 'Worried we'll say something cheeky and get caught?'

Yes.

She shook her head. 'No, it's just a good habit to get into. You don't want to leave it on all the time because then you'll never remember to turn it off and suddenly we'll have audio access to everywhere you go — your room, the toilet — '

'Good god.'

Lily nodded. 'I know. Our bachelor last year found that out the hard way.'

They chatted aimlessly as they continued across the sand, and Lily turned to him as they reached the long flight of stairs back up to the road. She wasn't sure how much he remembered of their conversation about post-date procedure, and she figured that it would be best to remind him (and herself).

'So, Benjy will be in the car when we get up there.'

'Oh, alright.' James started up the stairs and Lily followed behind.

'We just need to get some post-date interviews. So you'll sit — well, we'll have to figure out with the lighting when we get in there, actually — but you'll sit wherever we put you and I'll ask you some questions and you'll just talk into the camera.'

'Is this stuff that's going to go in between clips of the date?'

'Yeah. So I'll ask you about some things that I saw while you were out throwing the discus or whatever you were all doing —'

James laughed. '"Throwing the discus or whatever". Evans, you should've lived in Ancient Greece. You could've written the promotional materials.'

Lily smacked the back of his elbow. 'Shut up.'

James sent her a cheeky smile over his shoulder as they stepped onto the pavement at the top of the stairs and Lily rolled her eyes at him.

' _Anyway,'_ Lily took her bag off her shoulder and stuffed it into James' hands, pointed him into the changing tent a few metres away. 'I'll have questions prepared, so just do your best to think back when you can. If you can't remember the details around what I'm asking about, just let me know. I remember them.'

James zipped the tent shut behind him and Lily heard the rustle of fabric from inside. Her mind immediately catapulted into the gutter.

'How do you know you remember them?' She couldn't see his face, but she could tell from his tone of voice that he was grinning that cheeky grin he got whenever he was teasing her.

'I've been doing this forever,' she said. 'I've got a good memory.'

'Alright. So I just answer questions and that's it?'

Lily nodded and then, realizing James couldn't see her, said, 'Yeah, basically. We've got a forty-five minute drive back to the villa, so if we're good, I bet we can get these shot before we get back.'

'Well, great news, Evans —' James stepped out of the tent, now fully clothed, and grinned at her. 'I'm always good.'

He winked and Lily did her best to cover up the fact that she was now having a mild stroke. She'd forgotten how nice he'd looked when she'd picked him up at the villa that morning. He was still wearing joggers and a t-shirt, but the overall effect of the outfit — _damn._ Especially now that she had a clear picture of what he had under those clothes burned into her memory.

'See, that right there —' she drew a circle in the air around his head as they started down the pavement towards the car at the opposite end. 'That's why we turn off the mic.'

James laughed, stepped closer, and dropped an arm around her shoulders. Even now that he was wearing a shirt (a blessing and a curse, really, given how nice he looked in red), she was still finding it difficult to breathe when he was standing this close to her. The heavy weight of his arm around her shoulders was just enough to get her mind started down the path of what it would be like to have the weight of the rest of him hovering over her — something she shouldn't be thinking about now matter how… interesting she might find the prospect.

'Always trying to keep me in check, Evans.'

'Someone's got to.'

James pulled his arm from around her and opened the door when they reached the town car. They climbed into the back, grinning at Benjy as they settled into their seats.

'How was the date?' Benjy raised an eyebrow at James from behind the camera as James leaned forward in his chair, reached back, and turned his microphone back on.

'Date was great! I think everyone had a great time.'

Lily saw Benjy flick on his camera beside her, and she looked at James as the car pulled out of the drive and back onto the main road.

'Ready?'

James nodded. 'Absolutely.'

The interview took most of the drive back to Oia, but Lily was still impressed by how quickly they managed to move through most of her questions. James was good at recognising the kind of content that she was looking for — comments about individual contestants, honest reflections regarding his own feelings — and he made sure to incorporate that into his answers wherever possible.

It was more difficult to get him to talk about Laura, though.

Lily knew that he'd seen the way she'd been behaving throughout the date — talking shit about other women right in front of them, being generally dismissive anyone who talked to her that wasn't James — but he didn't seem to want to drag all of that back out in the interviews on the way home.

'I don't know why you want to talk about her,' he said. His tone was sharp and Lily could tell that he was getting frustrated. 'It's enough that Pratigrew made us keep her here. Do I really have to talk about her at every goddamn turn, too? Wouldn't you rather hear about the women that are actually decent?'

Lily sighed. It was a thin line she was walking between looking like she was pushing him to stir up more drama and trying to save him from the fallout that she knew Peter had in mind. There were very few ways for her to play this successfully, so she started with the first one she had in mind.

'James, we can't just ignore the way that she's behaving. People will see that when the episode airs and wonder why you aren't addressing it.'

'Doesn't acknowledging her shitty behaviour and then continuing to keep her on make it look like I'm condoning it?'

Well shit.

'So, your plan is to say nothing and hope that the public assumes you aren't noticing it?'

'If I had my way, my plan would be to ask her to leave at the ceremony this week so that we don't have to continue dealing with this at all. But I'm sure that that's not in the cards for this week, is it?'

He —

Lily _knew_ they'd talked about this. Remembered, vividly, the upset and confused look on his face two nights ago in Rome when she'd told him about the clause in his contract. They hadn't really gone into detail about the contract bit — James was mostly focused on the fact that Laura wasn't able to be eliminated on the first bloody night — but she remembered mentioning it.

Hadn't she mentioned it?

Lily must have been giving him some kind of look, because James crossed his arms and frowned at her.

'You and I both know that there's some list floating around on your side,' James snapped, 'don't act like there isn't. How much longer are we going to have to put up with Laura's shit?'

'I —'

He'd clearly forgotten. He'd forgotten, in the haze of stress and alcohol from that first night, and she probably shouldn't remind him, especially not now when it was likely to derail the rest of the interview and she really needed to get this out of the way today.

Lily saw Benjy giving her a look out of the corner of her eye, but, because she's an idiot, she ignored him.

She sighed heavily. 'The plan is to keep Laura on for a few more weeks, yeah.'

' _Lily._ '

'Are you fucking _kidding_ me?!'

Benjy and James spoke at the same time, and it was hard to decide who she wanted to answer less. She took one look at the livid expression on James' face, though, and turned to Benjy.

'It's not like we're keeping this some kind of secret, Fen. He'd find out at the end of every week anyway. And the only reason he doesn't know now is because he didn't read his fucking contract.'

James shouted, 'I read my contract!' but Lily and Benjy both ignored him.

'Peter is going to be properly pissed off though when he finds out you told him, you know he is.'

She'd already fucking told him once before, but Lily didn't need to let Benjy know that. And really, if Marlene hadn't been worried about it when the words had come out of her mouth the first time, Lily really didn't think that Benjy had anything to worry about. She just shrugged. 'Whatever. He knows that James isn't thrilled about having to keep Laura here, anyway. It's not like this would be a surprise to him.'

'So I'm supposed to keep Laura on for _weeks_?' James said, and the anger in his voice was making it harder for Lily to ignore him. 'There's nothing I can do about this? Really?'

Lily turned back to James and sighed. 'There's a clause in your contract — we're allowed to designate one contestant out of the pool as our override for the first five weeks of the competition. Laura got Peter's designation night one.'

She waited for the recognition to dawn on James' face, for him to remember that they'd already talked about this, but he just sat there quietly for a moment when Lily finished speaking and said nothing for a long moment.

There was still no sign that he recalled a damn thing when he looked back up at her. 'So she's allowed to go home week five?'

Lily nodded. 'Yes. She can go home at the week five selection ceremony, or, if she's chosen for a selection date, she can go home on the date.'

James sighed and turned to look out the window. He still looked cross with her, but he looked like he was at least accepting the fact that he was a bit penned in where Laura was concerned. They included everything in these contracts, closed every loophole — there was little room to move and steep fines (at best) if you acted against the agreement.

That was actually something she needed to keep in mind — those penalties were a solid reminder to check her damn feelings.

Lily watched the side of James' face as the scenery outside flashed across his glasses. She could feel Benjy looking at her, but she wasn't going to open that up right now. Not with James' mic on and the camera on and everything that was bound to come out if they really got into it. She wasn't sure what he was so fucking upset about — I mean, honestly, if Marlene was fine with it —

After a long minute, James turned back to look at her — he looked exhausted and _god_ she felt horrible. 'James — '

James shook his head. 'It is what it is. It isn't your fault, you're —' He took a deep breath. 'You're just doing your job. I — it's your job and I signed the stupid thing, so, really, this is my fault.'

'Still, James, I'm sorry.'

He shook his head at her again and Lily dropped her gaze, looked at her knees. 'No need to be sorry, Lily. You didn't do this.'

She felt like she'd done this. But there was no point in arguing about it with him — neither of them could change anything about it now and they certainly weren't going to be able to come up with a plan to convince Peter to change his mind and let James out of the clause.

'Hey.'

Lily looked up and met James' gaze. He wasn't smiling, but his expression had softened and she felt her heart climb into her throat.

'We'll deal. With this Laura thing, we'll deal. There's a way to make it workable and it's only five weeks. We can do five weeks.'

James evened out his expression, shifted in his seat a bit. Then he looked right at Lily and when he spoke, Lily raised an eyebrow at him.

'I know that this journey is really stressful, but I'd hope that everyone involved is able to be supportive and kind to one another. I really don't like when people mistreat others because they think it's going to put them further ahead. That kind of thing doesn't work for me.

'I'm looking forward to getting to know everyone over the next few weeks — there are so many amazing women here and I think we could all get on really well. I just hope that everyone is able to be respectful and recognise that this journey is difficult on everyone involved.'

He paused for a moment and then let himself relax.

'That work?'

LIly cleared her throat. 'Could do, yeah.'

James nodded, leaned forward in his seat and reached back to shut his mic off again. 'Can we be done with this camera now? I want to talk about _Crystal Skull_ again.'

A smirk crept onto his lips and Lily sighed angrily. 'You are _such_ a prat. That movie is garbage, there's nothing else you can say about it, because you're never going to convince me!'

'This is really difficult for me, Evans,' James said, the grin on his face growing. 'I wish you would respect that.'

Lily glanced out the window and noticed that they were rounding the corner at the top of the hill near the villa. She turned to James.

'Looks like we're almost home.'

'We can continue the fight in the house.'

Lily pressed her lips together. 'I have to get back to the hotel. Get some sleep.'

James checked his watch. 'It's eight.'

'Jetlag.'

'How?'

'James — '

'You can't stay and just hang out for a minute?' He was frowning at her, and though the expression was almost comical, it made her really, really want to give in.

Lily shook her head and turned away. 'Can't. I have to catch up with Mary about the plan for tomorrow, we have a short production meeting in,' she checked her watch, 'an hour, and then I really have to go to bed.'

James sighed as the car pulled into the drive and stopped in front of the villa. 'So I'm going to be in the house all alone?'

' _James,_ come on, you'll be fine.'

'Who even knows? Maybe I'll be so lonely in there that I'll start to go mad.'

Lily rolled her eyes, smile breaking onto her lips. 'God, you're dramatic.'

James grinned. 'I'll see you tomorrow, Evans?'

She nodded. 'Eight A.M.'

James nodded, his eyes on hers as he reached for the door handle. He held her gaze and, for a moment, she thought there was something different in the way he was looking at her. His expression was serious, like the weight of whatever he was thinking was pressing on him.

She couldn't tell if what he was thinking was good or bad.

James climbed out of the car, shut the door behind him, and started up the path towards the house. He turned when he reached the top of the stairs and stared back at the car for a minute before he ducked into the house and shut the door behind him.

Benjy started taking off his gear and packing it away as the car pulled back out onto the main road. They were quiet for a minute, the sound of velcro and zippers the only noise in the car. Lily pulled her mobile out of her back pocket and started scrolling through her email.

Maybe, if she was really lucky, her production meeting would be cancelled for tonight and she could just go and get right in bed.

'You really can't let him get to you like that.'

Lily looked up and found Benjy staring at her. 'What are you talking about?'

Benjy snorted and resumed packing his things. 'Lily.'

'What?!'

'Peter is going to _kill_ you.'

Lily scoffed. 'For telling him something he already knows? Or would know if he bothered to read anything we put in front of him?'

Or would know if he hadn't gotten fucking pissed that first night and forgotten everything.

'For confirming something he _thought_ he knew,' Benjy said. 'This isn't your first year doing this, Lily, you know better than that.'

Lily glared at him. 'Don't start talking to me like I'm an idiot —'

'I'm not, or at least I'm not trying to. I just want you to think about what you're doing with him.'

She crossed her arms. 'I'm not _doing_ anything.'

'But Lily, you're — your judgment on this —'

'Fen, just fucking stop before you bury yourself any fucking deeper, yeah? There's nothing going on and anything you're "seeing" you're blowing completely out of proportion, so just stop.'

Benjy sighed angrily and Lily thought that he might say something else, but after a long minute, he started unscrewing the lens from his camera and the silence stretched out between them.

They were silent for the rest of the drive back to the hotel.


	17. Chapter 16

**for my tumblr anon who doesn't feel like working at work**

 **I got you, mate**

* * *

Sunday's group date at the open air theatre in Kamari, a mildly embarrassing date where the contestants had been broken into two groups and asked to write their own plays, went much the same as the Olympics. The plays weren't the most entertaining things to watch, but some of the women, like Anja and Hannah, had brilliant comedic timing, and there was just enough drama between the women at the fringes (like Anna and Sofie) that Lily knew they were going to have some solid footage for air.

Tonight, though, was James' first one on one date, and he was almost unbearably nervous.

He kept running his hand through his hair and fidgeting with things (he popped a cufflink just as they were leaving the villa and they spent ten minutes on their hands and knees looking for the damn thing). Now that they were sitting in the car, his knee was bouncing rapidly beside her and the force of it was shaking his upper body a bit. She kept asking him questions, kept trying to get him to talk about the date ahead so they could get something good for air, but he just kept muttering and shaking his head nervously and losing focus.

Lily leaned into Benjy's shot and pressed her hand into James' knee.

'Breathe.' She squeezed his knee and James pulled his gaze from the window to look up at her.

'You're going to be alright. It's a date — you've been on these before, haven't you?'

'Not when they've been filmed. And not when I've had to eat beforehand.'

Lily pulled in a slow, deep breath and hoped that James would mimic her.

'You're going to be alright. We just have you eat beforehand because we don't want you to spend most of the date shoving food in your face. Doesn't make for good television.'

'I — excuse me, I don't shove food in my face. I'm a graceful eater.'

Lily snorted. ' _Okay,_ well, that isn't even the point, is it? We want you both to talk and you can't do that if you're eating.'

'I get that, but then why set up a dinner date? Why serve food if we aren't going to eat it? Won't it just go to waste?'

'Someone on the crew will eat it,' Lily said. Her mobile pinged with an email, so she dropped her gaze to click into her email client.

'Are you sure it won't go to waste?'

Lily looked up and her eyes found his. He looked genuinely concerned and the annoyed part of her softened. 'Yes, James. I'm sure.'

They pulled up outside the restaurant a few minutes later, a small, white building set so perfectly into the hillside that you might not even realise it was there at first. There was a small outdoor seating area, already complete with cameras and lights, where James and Liza would be having dinner — it had a light breeze, smelled of salt, and overlooked the sea. It was beautiful and would be even better once the sun started going down.

It was going to make lighting a bit of a bitch, but, as Lily had assured Peter a million times already that day, the romance of the whole scene was going to make the lighting headache worth it.

The car came to a stop just down the hill from the restaurant and Lily held up her finger at James to stop him opening the door. She grabbed her radio off her hip.

'Lily for Mary.'

The car was quiet for a moment before Lily's radio crackled to life again. 'Go for Mary.'

'Hill cameras ready?'

'They're ready.'

'Alright, James flying in.'

Lily stuck her radio back on her hip and turned to James.

'You're going to get out of the car, walk up the hill, and turn into the restaurant. There will be cameras on you the minute you get out, so,' she drew a circle in the air around her face, gave him a big smile, 'you know.'

James nodded. 'Are you coming?'

'Once they let me know they got the shot, I'll follow behind. I'll be there in five unless Jax makes you re-shoot something.'

James grinned. 'Guess I'll see you in ten, then.'

Lily laughed. 'Ten.'

James climbed out of the car and Lily turned around in her seat to watch him start up the hill towards the restaurant. She heard Benjy sigh as she lifted herself up so she could see, but Lily refused to acknowledge him.

She wasn't going to open this conversation again. Not right now.

Benjy had made a point to come over and apologise before the Kamari date the day before. Said he'd been talking to Marlene and she'd mentioned that she had told James in the park back in May about the five week clause and she had no idea that James didn't know.

'We've told him a million times,' Benjy said Marlene had said. 'He's got a mind like a sieve when it comes to these sorts of things.'

Lily didn't ask why Benjy and Marlene had been talking — she could guess and, really, she didn't want to know — but she was grateful that he'd taken the time to ask about what James knew before he spent the rest of the time glowering at her about giving away all the show secrets.

Despite having made up about the contract, though, she was still annoyed with him about the rest of it. Even when he was apologising, he was reminding her that he didn't think her relationship with him was entirely professional, didn't think that it was going to work out if she kept on with it long term.

'You should see if someone on the contestant side will switch in with you,' he'd said, 'you're getting too close to this.'

Lily had told him to piss off and she hadn't really been able to talk to him reasonably since.

Partially it was because she knew that he was onto something. She knew that the way she looked at James, the way she _was_ with James, was likely to get her into trouble if she wasn't careful. She knew that the sensible option probably would be ask someone like Cara to switch roles with her. It would be chaotic for a bit, having to learn Cara's contestants and switch things around in her head, but it wasn't something that was completely foreign to her, the contestant side of things.

She could do it.

She just didn't want to do it. She didn't want to do it at all.

It was much easier to pretend that she was cross with Benjy because he was being unreasonable than it was to admit that the cracks in her self-control were starting to show.

Lily bit her lip when James turned at the top of the hill and started back down, laughed out loud when James looked at the car where she was sitting and pulled a face. She didn't know how he knew she was watching him, but she was glad that he knew her well enough to assume.

He'd just walked back up over the hill again when her radio clicked on from her hip and the static crackled to life in her earpiece.

'Mary for Lily.'

Lily unclipped the radio and clicked the button on the side. 'Go for Lily.'

'Shot's good, you're clear.'

'Flying in.'

Lily slid across the seats and popped open the door James had climbed out of a few minutes before. She started making her way quickly up the hill, scanning the crowd at the top as she went to try and find James.

She spotted him standing behind the ring of lights surrounding the table.

'Hey.' He turned and grinned down at her as she came to a stop beside him.

'Did you see that Jax made me re-shoot?'

Lily laughed. 'Yeah. Nice face, by the way.'

He smirked.

'Why did he make you re-shoot?'

James rolled his eyes, leaned down a bit so he could lower his voice. 'I didn't look confident enough on the walk up apparently.'

Lily snorted.

James breathed a laugh. 'Shut up. Alright, tell me what to do.'

They spent a few minutes going over the choreographed bits — James meeting Liza at the door, which path they were supposed to take back through the restaurant, how he was supposed to angle himself in his chair just so, so that he was facing out towards the cameras. James kept fidgeting as they went over things, adjusting his hair, straightening his glasses, and these visual signs of just how nervous he was twisted at her gut, no matter how much she tried to ignore them.

James took his glasses off, blew on the lenses, and polished them against the thigh of his suit trousers.

'Alright,' Lily said, a bit louder than strictly necessary, and James looked up at her as he slid his glasses back onto his face. 'Liza should be here soon, so do you have any other questions?'

James shook his head. 'No, I, uh — I think I'm good.'

Her radio crackled to life in her ear. 'Kate for Mal.'

Lily looked up at James while Kate and Mal had nearly the same conversation she'd had with Mary a short while before. 'Liza's just arrived,' Lily said, turning the volume down on the radio so she could better hear herself, 'so you'll —'

'Walk back through the restaurant, stand and wait for her by the front door, and then walk her through to the outside seating.' James tipped his head at the table behind them. 'Then sit, pretend to eat, and talk.'

Lily nodded, reached out and patted his elbow. 'Brilliant. Now go on. I'll be back behind the line if you need me.'

James turned on his heel and started walking swiftly through the restaurant just as Kate said, 'Liza's flying in,' in Lily's ear.

Lily watched James walk away before she pulled in a deep breath, squared her shoulders, and walked back behind the cameras.

She was so nervous. Why the fuck was she so nervous?

For a few minutes, there wasn't anything to look at, but then Lily saw one of the steadicam guys (Basil, maybe, but she couldn't tell from this distance) backing out into the open air seating, his camera on James and Liza as they laughed about god knows what.

They looked — they looked _stunning._

James was laughing and he had his head tipped back, his hair flopping a bit off his forehead, and Liza was looking up at him, her short red hair curling around her face, a bright smile on, a deep purple dress hugging her curves — she was beautiful. They were beautiful.

Lily couldn't watch. She turned away, pretending to be looking for something, when she noticed Kate moving towards her from the edge of the crowd. Kate smiled at Lily as she slid through the cameras, and she leaned over to whisper in her ear when she stopped at Lily's side.

'It's like watching our kids go out, isn't it?'

Lily laughed and Jax immediately whipped around. 'Quiet around the cameras, please!'

Kate caught Lily's gaze and rolled her eyes. Lily managed a smile and a shrug before Jax re-set the scene and she and Kate lapsed into silence.

So it was for the next few hours — Lily and Kate whispered back and forth whenever Jax was setting shots or shouting or doing whatever it was he needed to do, and Lily expended an extraordinary amount of energy to keep from watching James.

She had nothing else to look at when they were actually filming so she might have watched a little then, but the bits between the shots — sometimes those were the best bits. They were the bits that told you what was really there because the pressure was off and there was no worry that you'd look terrible in front of a camera and you could just breathe.

It was where the relationships started to grow, those off camera moments. Lily couldn't bring herself to watch those.

Lily heard Liza laugh from across the set then, a bright, loud laugh, and, in spite of herself, Lily looked up.

She shouldn't have looked up.

James had slid his chair around the front of the table (that, apparently, was what had set Jax off this time because now that Lily was looking, she realised that he was moving cameras) and he was leaning close to Liza. Lily couldn't hear what they were saying from here and she had _no_ desire to go over to the monitors and listen — it was enough that she could see them practically snuggling up against each other at the table.

'Hey, Kate, I got the eyeliner you were asking for.'

Mal, Kate's PA, slid out from the crowd of people bumped out around the set and handed Kate a few eyeliner pencils. Lily was glad of the distraction and turned her attention to Mal, who smiled at her before looking back at Kate.

Kate nodded. 'Thanks.'

Mal pointed at the navy pencil with the gold lid. 'That one's got glitter in. I swatched it and no fall out, so ten out of ten, would recommend. Plus, Alice told me it's brill, so.'

Kate nodded, uncapped the pencil Mal had indicated, and drew a thin, dark line over the back of her hand. 'Huh. Alright, thanks, Mal. I think we'll go with this one.'

Mal grinned. 'Can I get either of you anything else?'

Lily and Kate both shook their heads. 'Nope, we're good,' Kate said. 'Can you just go check how Liza is doing?'

Mal nodded and took off towards the set.

'I'm sure she'll ask James how he's doing, too,' Kate said, shooting Lily a look as she stuffed the eyeliners into her pocket. 'She's been angling to talk to him since we started shooting.'

Lily thought Kate might be being a bit snide, but then Kate turned and looked at her more fully. 'And who wouldn't, honestly? He's _fine._ I'm not even going to lie, I'm so jealous that you get to spend all your time with him this year.'

Lily laughed, reached up and tucked a piece of hair behind her ear. 'Yeah, he's great.'

'I'm sure he's a gem,' Kate said, rolling her eyes. 'But it's the rest,' she drew a circle in the air with her hand, 'that we're all focused on here.'

It was completely irrational, what she felt at that. This time last year, she and Kate and Cara had been laughing about last year's bachelor and saying the exact same things — there was no reason that this year should be different. She shouldn't be feeling this strange, almost protective feeling, shouldn't be thinking up all the things she could say to tell Kate just how much of a _gem_ he really was.

She needed to change the subject before she said something completely stupid.

'How are things over on the contestant side?'

Kate laughed. 'Don't tell me you miss it, Lil?'

Lily shook her head. ' _God_ no. I know how lucky I am to be off that beat this year. But that also means that I don't really know the contestants as well and it's hard to talk with James about them.'

Kate raised an eyebrow. 'He asks your opinion?'

'Yeah, you know,' she shrugged, tried to look casual. 'Sometimes. We just get to talking about it or whatever.'

'Well, at the risk of being completely biased, Liza,' Kate nodded her head towards the table Lily had been trying to forget. 'Liza is pretty great. She's a geography teacher and she coaches her school's football team. She's insufferably nice — it's been impossible to get good diaries out of her because she won't say a word against anyone.'

Lily decided to commiserate instead of allowing herself to acknowledge the jealous twisting in her stomach. 'Oh god, I hated that so much last year.'

'Right? Like, I get that they don't want to look like total bitches on television, but come on. This is my job, just say _something_ I can twist and make shittier than it is.' Kate reached into her pocket and pulled out a protein bar, held it out to Lily.

'Want one?'

Lily nodded. 'Thanks. I forgot all my damn snacks today.'

Kate pulled another bar from her pocket and shook it admonishingly at Lily. 'Is this your first year? Come on.'

Lily sighed, ripped open the packet and stuffed the wrapper into her pocket. 'I know, I know. Don't rub it in.'

'Though, to be honest,' Kate took a bite out of her bar and shoved the wrapper into her pocket. 'I only have these because Mal remembers to stuff them into her pocket whenever she walks by the crafts services table. I would starve to death without her.'

Lily held her bar up in a toast. 'To Mal, then.'

They ate their bars in silence while Jax made James and Liza re-shoot something Lily hadn't seen. Jax was making enthusiastic faces behind the camera, so whatever they were doing (Lily pretended that she couldn't see the way that Liza was tracing her fingers over the back of James' hand as it rested on the table) was satisfactory.

And then Liza took her fingers and threaded them through James' and Lily choked on her protein bar.

'Quiet around the cameras!' Jax turned and shot them a look like Lily was intentionally choking to death off screen. Lily raised an eyebrow at him as she cleared her throat, but she knew better than to fight him about it in the middle of a shoot.

There was always later if he was really going to be shitty about it. Though the good thing about Jax was that his shittiness was largely contained to the moments when the cameras were on. Lily had worked with enough directors who were cunts _all_ the time that she really appreciated the difference.

Lily cleared her throat again to dislodge the last piece of protein bar intent on blocking her windpipe, and leaned closer to Kate so that they could keep their voices low as Jax called for quiet again.

'So the contestants you're working with this year are great?'

Kate tipped her head from side to side noncommittally. 'Yeah. I mean, for the most part.'

Lily raised her eyebrows. 'Who do we need to watch out for?'

'Well, Laura's on my detail now —'

Lily leaned closer, drew in a dramatic breath. 'I thought Marc was responsible for her?'

'She was. But Marc's also got Sarah, and she and Laura got into it the other night.'

'What?!'

'Yeah. How didn't you hear about this?'

Lily shook her head. 'It didn't come up at the meeting the other day! How else would I have heard?'

'I thought someone might've told you. It's part of the reason Peter called all the PAs to the contestant house over the weekend.'

'No shit.'

'I know. Apparently Laura was bragging about having her phone and Sarah confronted her and then it turned into a whole thing.'

'Did anyone get hurt?'

'Sarah tried to throw a punch, but Marc grabbed her before she could connect.'

'Fuck,' Lily chuckled under her breath. 'I bet Peter was livid about that.'

'You have no idea. I thought he was going to burn Marc at the stake.'

Lily snorted. 'I'm surprised he didn't have the PAs out gathering wood. So you're in charge of Laura now?'

Kate groaned. 'Yeah, and it's already a fucking nightmare. This morning she _accidentally_ dropped a thing of setting powder in Liza's suitcase. It was the closest Liza's come to saying anything nasty about anyone.'

Lily shook her head, disgusted. 'Jesus christ. Why's she like this?'

Kate shrugged. 'Who knows. It's going to make for great tv, so I'm sure she knows she's going to get a lot of airtime. I don't know what she expects to get out of it, though. She can't expect to win.'

'No way she wins — James wanted to get rid of her on night one. She was Peter's override.'

Kate leaned in, the thrilled surprise evident on her face. ' _Really_?'

Lily nodded. 'Yeah. James is counting down the days until that week five send off.'

'Can't imagine why.' Kate's tone was thick with sarcasm and Lily laughed under her breath.

'Besides Liza though,' Lily said, turning towards Kate so she didn't have to see the way that James was smiling at Liza across the table. 'Who else from your group do you think has a shot?'

'Hmm,' Kate let her eyes fall from Lily's and they went a bit unfocused as she mulled over her question.

'Olivia is pretty nice. She's always jumping around talking about these fucking charities she supports, which, honestly is fucking exhausting, but she's nice enough.'

Lily nodded and Kate continued. 'Really, most of my girls seem like they'll get decently far, but I don't know that any of them have a real chance at winning.'

'Except Liza?'

Kate nodded as she turned and looked back through the cameras towards the table where James and Liza were sitting. Lily reluctantly followed her gaze and saw Kate start to smile out of the corner of her eye.

'Except Liza.'


	18. Chapter 17

**happy Sunday my beautiful friends x**

* * *

As they prepared for the selection ceremony this time around, James seemed much more confident than he had in Rome.

'I'm not going to have _any_ issues remembering anyone's name this time,' he said, looking at Lily over his shoulder as he straightened his tie in the mirror.

'Do you know who you want to send home? We haven't even _started_ pulling together a list,' Lily said. 'We should actually write something up after each date. Start notes or something, you know, so that when we get to ceremony night we have something to go off of?'

James turned and leaned up against the edge of the chest of drawers. 'We _could_ do that, but I'd rather talk to you about _Crystal Skull_ after dates if I'm honest.'

Lily shot him a look. 'We're never talking about that nonsense movie ever again, you big prat.'

James barked a laugh. 'See, this is much better than coming up with lists of people to eliminate.'

'You're really alright with leaving it to the last minute?'

'I'm not _leaving it to the last minute,_ Evans, I'm just waiting until I have all the evidence before proceeding.'

She shook her head at him. 'You must've been something in school.'

James grinned. 'All my teachers loved me.'

'Loved when you left school, more like.'

'Excuse me, I'll have you know that one of my teachers went to as many home matches as she could when I played for Reading at the start of my career.'

Lily gaped at him. 'Really?'

James nodded. 'Yeah. She'd played as a kid and was still completely mad for it. Apparently she'd gotten injured pretty badly when she was, like, sixteen and couldn't play anymore. We ended up having that in common.'

His hand drifted subconsciously towards his right knee and Lily sighed. 'I'm sorry, James.'

He frowned at her. 'For what? You didn't fuck up my knee.'

'I'm just — it…. Sucks, is all.'

A slow smile tugged at the corner of James' lips. 'Yeah, it _sucks.'_

Lily huffed. 'Shut up. I'm trying to feel bad for you.'

James smiled at her, and though Lily thought it would have been teasing, it was soft and warm instead.

She wanted him to smile at her like that forever.

'You don't need to feel bad for me, Evans. I'm over it. Mostly. But thank you.'

Lily couldn't think of anything else to say, so she just nodded, looked back down at her mobile.

'Evans.'

His voice was soft, a little rough around the edges, and when she looked up and James was watching her. He ran his tongue over his bottom lip when her eyes met his, and she had to be imagining the look on his face. She had to be making it up, because he was looking at her like he wanted to get his hands on her, and there was no way that he could — she had to be reading that into it — but still the look in his eyes had started her heart pounding violently in her chest and when he pulled his eyes from hers and traced them over her, her entire body electrified.

Suddenly, though, it all faded away. Whatever he'd been thinking about to make him look at her like that must've snapped — his expression evened out and he dropped his gaze and he was quiet for a minute before he spoke.

'So, I don't feel like Gemma and I had all that much to talk about.'

Lily took a deep, quiet breath and swallowed hard to try and get her bearings. 'So, Gemma goes home this week.'

'Yeah,' he looked back up at her, watched as she started typing Gemma's name into the list on her mobile. 'Gemma goes home this week.'

They made their way through the rest of the list relatively easily. Lily had been planning to send James down into the cocktail party while she went to get Peter's approval, but George's car was held up (something about Lena not being able to find "her favourite fucking liquid lipstick") and they were already falling behind schedule.

It was the worst time to go try and get Peter to approve something, but he'd already royally fucked them last week by making them keep Laura on, so there wasn't really that much he could continue to do to make their lives hell.

Per James' contract anyway. He could torture Lily as much as he liked, but at least James was relatively protected.

She left James in his bedroom, told him to lay back, relax, read something when he protested about being left alone, and started downstairs to the converted living space. What had been just a few overhead lights when James arrived a few days earlier had slowly converted into a full film set — there were cameras everywhere, strips of cords running all over the floor, and the lights were making the room so hot that Lily broke into a mild sweat just stepping into the space.

She had half a mind to step over to the far wall and push open a few windows, but she knew that someone on the crew would kill her if she so much as stepped in that direction.

They'd spent all day wiring the place and the last thing they needed was a breeze no one accounted for. Everyone was just going to have to sweat it out.

Lily made a mental note to check that Alice was bringing more powder and blotting papers.

She moved carefully over the wiring, grabbed a few protein bars off the crafts services table as she strode past, and stuffed them into her pockets as she made her way through the reception space to the kitchen that Peter had co-opted. He was sitting at the table with his back to her when Lily walked in, and though there was a wall of monitors set up in front of him, Peter was fiddling with something on his mobile rather than looking at any of them.

Not that there was that much to look at at this point, but still. Any excuse to hate him was a good one in Lily's book.

She cleared her throat, and Peter sat up straighter in his chair, turned and looked over his shoulder.

'What you do you want, kid?'

To punch you right in your stupid face.

'We finalised the list for tonight, wanted to run it by you.'

Peter leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms over his chest. 'He didn't try to sneak little Laura on there did he?'

Lily kept her expression as neutral as possible. 'He knows the rules.'

Peter studied her for a moment, but, once he realised that Lily wasn't willing to say any more, nodded. 'Let's hear that list, then.'

'Gemma Fox,' Lily paused to give Peter room to object, but he just nodded, didn't say anything, and so she continued. 'and Alexis Harding.'

'Just two this week?'

'That's the scheduled number, yes,' Lily said. Her tone was completely even but the "fuck you" was clear. 'We're supposed to go to Scotland with eighteen.'

'Well, alright, if you say so.' Peter waved her off and Lily had to grind her teeth against all the shit she wanted to say to him just then.

She went to turn and walk away, but Peter made a sound and Lily looked back up at him.

'How's it going with little Laura by the way? She got me some great footage this week.'

Lily nodded. 'So I heard.'

Peter's smile widened. 'Think you could get James to take her on the one on one next week? She would drive the other girls _mad_ with that invite.'

'I don't think that's something he's going to go for, no.'

'Can't you just tell him it's in his contract? We both know he hasn't read it.'

'I've read it.'

Peter rolled his eyes. 'And?'

Lily crossed her arms and tilted in head in annoyance. 'I'm not just going to lie to him.'

'Why not? You had no problem lying to the girls last year.'

She hated that he was right.

'New year, new me.' Her tone was deadpan, her expression calm — she hoped it was enough to hide the outrage starting to boil inside her.

Peter just rolled his eyes again and turned back around in his chair, and Lily recognised the dismissal.

'Thanks for your input.' She didn't bother to keep the edge out of her voice, and though she saw Peter start to turn before she walked away, Lily didn't once look back.

It took the whole walk back to James' room to feel like she could breathe again.

James was sitting on the bed when Lily walked into his room. He looked up as she shut the door and immediately frowned at her.

'What's wrong?'

Lily waved her hand, looked down and started adjusting the radio on her hip. 'Nothing's wrong.'

'Why are you lying?'

'I'm not.'

'Who's Pratigrew making us keep now?'

'I — no one. He's got one override per your contract and he's already used it up.'

'Then what did he do to you?'

Lily sighed. There was literally no point trying to pretend like she wasn't irritated, especially because she knew him well enough now to know that he wasn't going to drop it.

'It's just his usual shit,' she said. She crossed to his chest of drawers and grabbed his mic, started checking it over. 'It's like he thinks it's impossible to just be pleasant. Every time I talk to him, I'm grinding my goddamn teeth.'

'You shouldn't do that,' James said, and when she turned to look at him, he was grinning at her. 'You'll fuck up your teeth.'

She shot him a look and his grin widened. She laughed in spite of herself.

'He's just an arsehole,' she stepped towards James and handed him the mic, watched as he hooked the pack onto his back and started threading the wires up the back of his shirt. 'I don't know why I let him get to me like that.'

'It's perfectly reasonable to be upset when someone talks to you the way Pratigrew talks to you.'

'I know, but — I mean, it's not like he's always entirely off the mark.'

'Lily.' James raised his eyebrows are her. 'What are you talking about? Of _course_ he's off the mark.'

Lily sighed and James shook his head. 'Evans, come on. You're amazing. How could anything that arsehole says about you be true?'

'I —'

Lied to a lot of women last year and Peter's right when he points that out? Made a lot of women look like idiots on television to keep her job?

She should tell him all of it, should tell him right now, but she knew how James would look at her afterwards and she wasn't sure she could stomach it.

'Whatever,' Lily waved her hand, looked past James' shoulder so she didn't have to look him in the eye. 'It doesn't matter —'

'Yes it does. It matters what you think about yourself.'

'It doesn't —'

'Well, it matters to me.'

She looked at him then, and the intensity in his expression — his features were completely even, there was nothing, at first glance, that looked different about the way that he was looking at her, but there was a heat in his eyes that hit heavily in her gut and made her breath catch in her throat.

She looked back for a moment, one long moment, before she pulled in a deep breath. 'I — thank you.'

She knew that she should explain this to him, should use this opportunity to tell him everything that she'd done last year, to let him know exactly the kind of person she was. She should tell him, but then James nodded and it was easier to fall back and pretend that she was alright.

James was still looking at her a bit more closely than usual as he pushed himself up off the end of the bed and finished securing his mic round the front of his shirt, but, if he realised that there was more she hadn't said, he didn't seem like he was going to press her to talk about it.

She couldn't decide if she was happy or disappointed about that.

When James finished doing up his mic, he straightened his shirt and looked at himself in the mirror before he turned and smiled at her.

Everything was forgotten in that smile. Everything was new again.

Lily smiled back.

'How do I look?'

Her smile widened. 'Stunning as always.'

She grabbed his suit jacket off the dressing table and handed it to him. She watched as James slid into it, followed his hands as they ran down his lapels and buttoned the top button of his jacket. When she looked up again, she found him watching her — she should, probably, have been embarrassed at being caught looking at him like she had been, but the look on James' face — he didn't seem sorry about it.

He looked at her for a moment, a beat longer than he probably should have, before he cleared his throat and a smile slid across his face.

'Let's go.'

The rest of the evening, thankfully, flew by. It was a hot, sweaty mess, there were a few tears, but, all in all, the evening was one that Lily regarded as a success.

Mostly because she was able to get back to her villa before the sun actually came up and get a few more hours of sleep than she'd expected.

Despite this being the second elimination of the series, James was much more comfortable and confident in his choices this time around. He had something to go on when he was making these decisions, and that was clear in the way that he conducted himself throughout the evening and in the elimination. Jax still made them re-do a few things — Liza catching his hand as they moved to sit out on the back patio overlooking the sea, Summer making him laugh about something Lily couldn't remember now — but on the whole, most of the evening was captured fairly seamlessly.

Lily almost couldn't believe that it had been real.

When she woke up to her phone blaring in her ear the next morning, though, all her blissful positivity went right out the window.

'What?'

'Lily!' The minute Lily heard Marlene's voice she groaned, turned and buried her face back in the pillow.

'What the fuck do you want, Mar?'

'Where are you?'

'Bed. Why? I'm not going on a run with you or doing anything else, so don't even ask.'

' _Fuck._ Lily, it's ten. You were supposed to be here half an hour ago.'

Fuck.

'What?!' She sat bolt upright in bed, ripped the sheets off, and stumbled out of bed.

'Peter called an emergency meeting this morning. Didn't you get the text?'

She pulled her phone away from her ear and clicked into her messages, swore violently as she pressed it back to her ear.

'Does Peter know I'm late?'

'Please,' Lily could hear the eyeroll in Marlene's voice. 'I've sufficiently covered for you. But you better show up with enough coffees for everyone to make my story plausible.'

'You had to go and tell him that I _stopped_ — Mar —'

'I already sent Mary to go get them, so relax you bloody lunatic. Mary should be in the lobby of yours in a few minutes. Just go with her.'

'Marlene, you're a lifesaver.'

'I love you, too. Now get over here.'

Lily grabbed her clothes off the floor and started pitching them into her suitcase — she was going to regret not folding them later, but she really didn't have time to worry about that just now. She swept her hair up into a ponytail, jumped into the shower to wash her body quickly under the spray, and pulled on the first clean outfit she could find.

She had certainly looked better, but she wasn't trying to win any beauty awards today.

She swept the things off her bathroom counter into her toiletries bag, save the packet of makeup wipes that she stuffed in the back pocket of her jeans, and jammed the bag into her case as carefully as she could. She slid her shoes on as she scanned the room one last time for anything that she might have forgotten, and strode quickly out of her hotel room.

She only had to go back once because she'd forgotten her phone charger, but then she was down into the lobby and she saw Mary standing patiently over by the giant plant just inside the entrance.

'You,' Lily pulled her into a half hug so she didn't disrupt the tray of coffees in her hand, 'are a lifesaver.'

'It's no problem, Lily, really.' Mary smiled at her and Lily shook her head.

'Just — thank you. Can you do me one more favour?'

'Anything.'

'Can you check out for me? I have to get over to this meeting —'

Mary was nodding before Lily even finished her sentence. 'Of course. Just give me your room keys. I'll text you when it's finished.'

Lily fumbled in her pocket for the keys and pressed them into Mary's waiting hand. 'Perfect. Mary, thank you.'

'Of course! Your car is outside.'

Lily thanked Mary once more (it was a bit excessive, but it didn't even come close to expressing her gratitude for Mary in that moment) before she shifted the coffee carrier in her arms and rolled her case across the tiled lobby and out into the front drive. Sure enough, a black town car was sitting at the very front of the queue and Lily doubled her pace. She set her coffees on the roof, opened up the back door and popped her head in.

'Can you open the boot? Please?'

She heard the boot click open behind her and Lily shouted, 'Thanks,' into the back of the car as she grabbed her bag off the pavement and pitched it (a bit more carelessly than she should have) into the back. She slammed the door, grabbed her coffees off the top of the car, and slid carefully into the back seat, shifting the carrier onto her knee and leaning over to pull the door closed.

The driver pulled out of the drive the minute that Lily shut the door, and she breathed a massive sigh of relief. They drove in silence for a moment before Lily recovered and sat up a bit in her seat.

'How are you this morning, Aidan?'

The driver looked at her in the rearview mirror and smiled. 'I'm alright, Lil. How're you?'

Lily groaned. 'I'll be better once this meeting's over.'

Aidan chuckled softly under his breath and Lily smiled at him before she leaned her head back onto the headrest and let her eyes fall closed.

They pulled up outside James' villa a few minutes later and, though Lily was confused, she tried to push that to the back of her mind. She was going to have to walk in there like she had at least a faint idea of what the fuck was going on, and if she let herself try to puzzle through this on her walk inside, she knew that it was going to show plainly on her face.

She said goodbye to Aidan as she climbed out, grabbed her bag out of the boot, and carried everything carefully up the stairs into the villa. She pushed her bag up against the wall on the front patio — she wouldn't need it inside and she wasn't keen on the idea of rolling her hastily packed (and banged up) suitcase into the middle of meeting — and pushed open the door.

She could hear voices from the back of the house, near the kitchen where Peter had been working the day before, and she picked up the pace as she rounded the corner into the lounge.

'Sorry I'm late, everyone.'

Cara, Kate, Marc, George, Marlene, and Peter were sitting around the kitchen table, and they all (save Peter) turned and smiled at Lily when she walked in.

'Mary told us you were getting coffee,' Marlene said, getting up and taking the carrier from Lily. She gave her a significant look that Lily couldn't read before she turned and carried it back to the table.

'I know I needed it,' Lily said, smiling as she walked over and sat down in the free seat between Marlene and Cara. 'I figured I wasn't alone in that.'

Marc grabbed a coffee off the carrier and tipped it at her in thanks. 'No, you certainly weren't.'

'Well, you had a longer night than most,' Kate said. She leaned back in her seat and Lily could just see the ghost of a smile on Kate's face.

Marc must have seen it, too, because he gave Kate the finger.

'Alright,' Marlene said, taking her coffee from the carrier and leaning back in her chair, 'settle down.'

It was testament to how much they all respected Marlene that they fell silent immediately.

'So, Marc,' Peter grabbed a few sugar packets and started dumping them into his coffee. 'Why don't you give us the run down since Vicky was your girl.'

Peter had that cool tone he used whenever he was unhappy about something, and Lily swallowed. She didn't expect a _good_ emergency meeting, but she didn't think it was going to be as bad as this seemed like it was going to be.

Marc had opened his mouth to speak, but George started talking before Marc could get a word out.

'Well,' George dropped his stirrer onto the table beside his cup, took a long, slow sip of coffee. 'I think she goes by Victoria, actually. But carry on, Marc.'

Lily watched Peter out of the corner of her eye and bit her lip to keep from smiling.

He was irate and George knew it.

'Last night,' Marc began, apparently keen to move on and avoid the argument, 'after the elimination, one of the contestants overheard Victoria talking about "her girlfriend" — they assumed, at first, that Victoria meant that they were just friends —'

Marlene snorted and Lily nudged her with her knee.

'But it eventually became clear,' Marc continued, 'that they're romantically involved. Currently.'

Lily's jaw dropped.

'They're still together?' Lily asked. 'Even though Victoria's on the show?'

Marc nodded. 'Apparently Victoria submitted her application for a laugh and when she was selected to move forward in the process, she and Chetna agreed that she should "give it a go" because "you only live once".'

'And,' George was visibly biting back a smile as he cut in, 'as it happens, we _met_ Chetna when we checked out Victoria's background. She told us they were housemates.'

'Oh my god, they were roommates,' Marlene muttered. Lily snorted into her coffee and Peter shot her a look.

'What's funny, Lily?'

She was doing a terrible job of covering her smile, but, truth be told, she didn't care nearly as much as she should.

'Nothing.'

Peter looked livid. 'Nothing?!'

'Anyway,' Marlene raised her voice to cut across Peter's outburst, and though Lily could see how much that had irritated him, he let it slide without comment.

'Victoria and Chetna have both signed revised NDAs,' Marlene said, 'and we have made it abundantly clear that any contact with the press regarding what Victoria has seen on the show or their relationship prior to and during filming will result in serious legal consequences. And, of course, Victoria is to leave the show immediately.'

'She filmed a diary early this morning,' Marc said, 'and we had her film a break up scene with James a few hours ago.'

'You what?' Lily turned and shot Marc a look. 'Why wasn't I contacted?'

'It was four in the morning —'

'I don't care, Marc! If you're filming with him, I need to know.'

'It was an hour,' Marc said, and though he sounded like he was apologising, Lily wasn't having any of it. 'Three takes. I didn't think I needed to drag you out of bed for that.'

'I appreciate you thinking about my beauty sleep, Marc,' Lily snapped, 'but really. Next time, call me. And get me that footage so I can review it.'

'Lily,' Peter smiled at her and it twisted Lily's stomach. 'Your boy was in good hands. Do you think we'd make him look a fool?'

Yes. Absolutely, without a doubt yes.

She looked away from Peter, turned to Marlene. 'I want to see that footage.'

Marlene pressed her lips together and Lily knew what Marlene was going to say before she said it.

'Lily — no. You can't.'

'Mar —'

'Lily.'

The admonishment was clear in her tone, the "don't you dare make me shout at you in front of your colleagues" painfully obvious, and though it was absolute last thing she wanted to do, Lily gritted her teeth and nodded.

If Marlene had been able to get her the footage she would've agreed straightaway. Putting up a fight was only going to make her look like an arsehole and put Marlene into a position that, as her friend, Lily was keen to avoid.

But it didn't mean she had to fucking like it.

'Now that Lily has stopped having a tantrum,' Peter said, shooting her an amused look before he looked at the group, 'let's finish up shall we? We have flights to catch.'

Lily took a sip of her coffee. Pressed her free hand into the table to stop it shaking.

God, she hated him. She hated him so much.

'We have a few of the PAs going back to double check the profiles of our remaining girls, but I want each of you to talk to your groups and let them know that there will be consequences if anything like this is discovered. Corner them if you have to —'

'Don't corner them,' Marlene interjected. 'Just — just speak with each of them privately. Get a sense of where they're at and make sure they understand the commitment they made.'

Lily looked at Marlene. 'Should I talk to James as well?'

She was still irritated, but Lily was pleased that she managed to keep her voice relatively even.

Marlene nodded. 'Please. He's the most heavily vetted out of all of them, but just — confirm. And remind him that any relationship or romantic involvement outside the show is in strict violation of his contract.'

Right.

Lily nodded. 'I'll talk to him.'

When they all got up from the table a few minutes later, Marlene reached out and touched her hand to the back of Lily's elbow, a quiet and subtle way to let her know that they were going to talk once they had the space to themselves. Kate, Cara, Marc, and George all left the house fairly quickly — they had contestants to get back to, after all — but Peter, despite his insistence that they all had flights to catch, seemed intent to hang around (if only because he knew, or guessed, that Lily wanted to talk to Marlene without interruption).

Completely uninterested in talking to Peter any longer than she had to, Lily slipped out of the kitchen and headed upstairs. Marlene would stick around (probably), and she could use the time, now, to talk to James.

To talk to James and make sure that he understood that he wasn't to get involved with someone that wasn't currently a contestant on the show.

She needed to have that conversation with herself, too, actually.

It wasn't like she was ever planning on _acting_ on the things that she thought about where James was concerned — she knew that acting on them was unrealistic. Couldn't happen. But she hadn't thought that it couldn't happen because of the contract. Not really, anyway. It was mostly that she knew it would be wrong, snogging James — no matter how much she wanted to, no matter how many women he was dating at the same time. It would be wrong, snogging James.

But god, if she didn't think about it. Damn near constantly.

She needed to remember that he'd signed a contract. She needed to remember that because she didn't want to back him into a corner.

Though they — they weren't even — he wasn't even interested in her, not like that, so this whole discussion was basically a waste of her time.

She just needed to get herself to stop thinking about snogging him every two bloody seconds.

She could do that.

It was surprisingly silent on the top level of the house. She'd thought that James would've woken up when they were meeting downstairs (or, more accurately, when she was shouting in the kitchen), but everything up here was still and quiet.

That alone told her that James had to be asleep. He was never quiet for long if he could help it.

She knocked on James' door and listened for any sound from inside.

Nothing.

She sighed and knocked again, this time pushing the door open and walking into his room.

'James?'

She stuck her head around the door and immediately regretted it.

How was she supposed to stop quietly lusting after him when he looked like that?

He had pyjama bottoms on (thank god), probably a remnant of what he'd worn when they woke him up early this morning to film Victoria's breakup scene. He didn't have a shirt on, though, and it was easy, even from this distance, to trace the lines of his muscles.

She cleared her throat.

'James. _James._ '

He shifted in bed, his hand reaching out automatically and pulling the blankets he'd kicked off up over his head.

Lily pressed her lips together to keep from laughing and stepped further into the room.

'Come on, James,' she reached out a hand and pulled the blankets off of his head. 'You've got to get up.'

He just groaned and shifted like he was going to turn over onto his stomach. Before Lily even properly thought about it, before she could stop herself, she reached forward and pressed her hand to his chest to stop his progress.

Without thinking, it seemed, James reached down and rested his hand on hers. He still hadn't opened his eyes, and thank god, because he did _not_ need to see the look that Lily was sure she had on her face.

And then he squeezed her hand, just the slightest bit of pressure, before he released her to reach up and rub at his eyes.

Lily snapped her hand back to her side.

'Are you awake?'

James shook his head. 'No.'

Lily raised her eyebrows. 'Then how are you talking to me?'

'Sleep talking.'

He still hadn't opened his eyes, so Lily let the smile spread across her face. 'Really?'

'Yeah. I'm a great sleep talker.'

Lily rolled her eyes. 'Well get up. I have to have an awake talk with you.'

'Why? They already woke me up in the middle of the night and I'm tired.'

'I know,' Lily said, 'but come on. You gotta get up.'

'Can't we just stay in Greece forever? What's in Scotland anyway? I've been to Scotland loads of times, I don't need to go again.'

'Are you aware of how pompous you sound?'

'I'm never pompous.'

Lily huffed. 'James, just get up.'

Finally, after much groaning and moaning about how awful it was, James pushed himself up to sitting. Lily tried not to watch the way his muscles moved as he sat up.

She took his glasses off his bedside table and handed them to him.

'Thanks.' He rubbed at his eyes again before he slid the glasses onto his face and opened his eyes.

'What time is it?'

'Half eleven.'

'God, I haven't slept this late in years.' He stretched his arms up over his head, and Lily looked away, took a few steps back so that there was a few feet between them.

It was too easy for her imagination to start giving her ideas when she was standing that close to the bed.

'So,' James scrubbed his hand through his hair, 'what do you need to talk about?'

'Your contract.'

James stilled. It was slight, subtle, but he sat up a little straighter, his hands stopped fidgeting, he stopped adjusting his weight on the bed to figure out how he wanted to sit.

'What about it?'

'You're not in trouble,' Lily said, and she should have fucking lead with that (though she hadn't expected James to get so nervous at the mention of his contract). 'It's just that after what happened with Victoria last night, Marlene and Peter have asked us to circle back and talk with everyone about it.'

James visibly relaxed. 'Oh, right.'

'Right. So, I have to ask you — do you have any existing or potential relationships with anyone outside the contestants on the show?'

And though James said, 'No,' there was something about the way that he looked at her then. She couldn't explain it, couldn't describe it, but it was there nevertheless.

She nodded slowly. 'Alright. And I should remind you that any relationship or romantic involvement outside the show is in violation of you contract. You know, in case something comes up.'

James raised an eyebrow. 'What do you expect will come up?'

'I — I don't know, I just was asked to remind you.'

'Do they think I have feelings for someone else? Marlene and all them?'

'No,' Lily shook her head, 'no, they're — we're just reminding everyone. The only one _actually_ in trouble is Victoria, but I reckon she's already halfway back to England.'

James nodded and Lily couldn't quite read the look on his face. It was frustrating, not having any idea what he was thinking. She'd gotten fairly good at interpreting his expressions since they'd started working together a few months ago (not that impressive, really, because he always wore his damn heart on his sleeve and told you what he was thinking about almost immediately), but the past few days, she's caught him looking at her with a look on his face like the one he was wearing now.

A too calm, too serious, too even expression that looked like he was desperately trying to conceal something from her.

But it had to just be the Victoria thing making her paranoid.

'Are you alright?' Lily asked. 'How're you feeling about Victoria and all that?'

James nodded and his expression brightened a bit. 'Yeah, I'm fine. A little confused as to why she was here if she had someone back home, but from what she told me this morning, she and Chetna are really happy together. How could I be angry about that? I didn't know Victoria that well anyway. It's not like she'd necessarily have stayed long even if she hadn't come clean about this whole thing. I'd rather she was at home with her girlfriend.'

'Is that what you said when they filmed the breakup with you this morning?'

'Yeah, basically — where were you, by the way? Marc said — well, I thought you were supposed to be there whenever they were filming shit with me in it.'

He'd tried to gloss over it, the fact that he'd almost thrown Marc under the bus, and Lily might've let him off, but she was still royally pissed off about the whole thing.

She put her hand on her hip. 'What did Marc say?'

'I — well, uhm, I asked where you were because I thought you said I wasn't supposed to film without you, and Marc — I mean —'

' _James_.'

'He said you'd said it's fine and to carry on without you.' He said it all in a rush and Lily immediately saw red.

'I'm gonna kill him.'

'Evans, come on — it — it's fine. It was fine.'

'That's not the point,' Lily raged. 'First, he knew bloody well that he wasn't supposed to be filming you like that, and, second he fucking lied to you to get you to agree to something you weren't supposed to agree to.'

'But it worked out. It was fine.'

'I just —' She raked her hand through her hair. 'I worry about them getting you to say something you don't mean when I'm not around.'

'What do you mean?'

There was no way to explain why she was as angry as she was without unravelling the whole thing. Explaining Peter's fucked up desire to make James look like an arse, explaining that Marc was still so new that he hadn't figured out to hate Peter yet. She'd have to tell him that she was far more intense about his filming schedule than she probably would've been for anyone else because she was bizarrely protective of him and she knew just how bad all this could get for him if she wasn't.

He'd believed in this when they'd started, this process, and though she had no idea why and she quietly thought he was an absolute _fool_ for thinking this show would bring him anything remotely resembling love, she still didn't want to have to crush that in him.

Or what was left of it after a week or so getting the gritty details of what goes on during filming.

But she couldn't let him go through the rest of this without knowing either. Not when she couldn't get a handle on how far Marc was in Peter's pocket, not when she knew full well that there were probably bonuses on the table on the contestant side. Peter had offered bonuses for all sorts of things last year, and she wouldn't put it past him to have a few on offer that would make James look —

Look terrible. Look like an arsehole. Look foolish.

And she knew it was foolish on her part, but she wanted the James on this show, _Eligible_ James that would take centre stage in all the gossip rags for the next six months — she wanted that James to be as close to the man she knew as she could get him.

Kind and warm and a big, dumb prat. Hilarious and handsome and — the kind of guy you just want to be around because there's something about him that you can't quite name.

The kind of guy that you could fall in love with.

So even though it was the last thing (or one of the last things) that she wanted to be doing, Lily took a deep breath and told him just enough.

'I mean that it's easy to take something you'd say innocently and twist it in editing so that it sounds completely different on the final show.'

'Do you really think they'd do that to me?'

'I — yes. Yeah, I do. Peter isn't exactly keen on you, you know.'

'And I don't have any say in this? I can't see the tapes before they go up or anything? I'm just going to have to watch when it's live and see if I look like a dick or not?'

'Basically, yes. Which is why —' James shouted, 'That's fucking bollocks!' over her, but Lily just nodded and kept talking.

'Which is _why_ I need to be there when they're shooting. I can't predict _everything_ that Peter will try to get the other producers to do, but I have a better idea of how they can change things around in editing — I've been making sure that you're not being talked into saying things you shouldn't.'

James dropped his gaze to his hands and was quiet for a long moment. She watched as he threaded and unthreaded his fingers as he thought, and the movement was surprisingly calming, despite the fact that she was now quietly panicking that he was going to do something drastic in response to what Lily had just told him.

And she hadn't even told him the whole thing. She'd made it sound like the editing room changes Peter was planning were _possible_ — she couldn't tell him that they were definite, that Peter had looked her in the eye and all but sketched out a plan for dragging James through the mud.

She didn't need to tell him that it was definitely something Peter was striving for. Keeping it in the realm of possibility as opposed to reality was the only way Lily knew to keep James from completely freaking out.

When he looked up at her then, Lily knew she'd made the right choice. Even this, this tiny bit of information, was making him nervous.

'You're — you know what they're planning? Pratigrew and all them?'

'I don't think it's everyone — it's definitely Peter and maybe Marc, but I can't be sure. He's still so new, and — he's difficult to get a handle on. I don't think Kate or Cara would do anything, and I don't think George, either, because he lowkey hates Peter as much as I do.'

'But you feel like you have an idea of the kinds of things they'd want to me say? To make me look like a twat?'

Lily nodded and James breathed a long sigh, raked a hand through his hair. 'Alright.'

Lily frowned. 'Alright?'

He nodded. 'Yeah. I trust you.'

Lily wasn't sure what to say to that, wasn't sure how to contain the feelings that had started rolling through her then — she just stood there, her eyes on his, and tried to think of something she could say that wouldn't give the whole game away. Something that would let him know that it meant a lot to her without letting him know exactly how much.

He trusted her. He trusted her and that meant more to her than she would ever have anticipated.

James cleared his throat. 'Alright. I guess we should start getting ready?'

It took a minute before it clicked in Lily's head what he was talking about.

'To go, yeah.' She nodded, checked her watch. 'Our car should be here soon, so I'll help you pack.'

'Would you mind if I grabbed a shower first?' He reached up and raked a hand through his hair. 'I definitely need a shower.'

'No, that's fine. Go ahead. I'll just start pulling stuff together so we can get going. I haven't seen Benjy all morning, anyway, so I should track his arse down.'

James nodded, and he got up, crossed the room, and grabbed an outfit from the chest of drawers. Lily started laughing as he tucked it into his arms and walked towards the bathroom.

'How many pairs of joggers did you bring?'

James turned and shot her a warm smile over his shoulder. 'You can never have too many joggers, Evans.'

He walked into the bathroom, shut the door softly behind him, and, once she heard the water start, Lily tried not to obsess about the fact that James, a very naked James, was only separated from her by a wall.

She frowned at herself in the mirror over the chest of drawers. 'Get it together, Evans.'

She sent Benjy a quick text to check where he was before she started pulling James' things out of the drawers, stacking them on top of the dressing table in neat piles. James joined her a few minutes later when he got out of the shower, water still dripping from his hair and trailing down his neck.

She spent a bit more time watching that than helping, if she was honest.

But they still managed to gather all his things from where he'd scattered them (a truly impressive feat, given the fact that they were only there for five days), and it was just gone noon by the time they were carrying his case back downstairs.

Her mobile buzzed in her pocket.

 _Benjy Fenwick: in the car on the way over. See you in a sec x_

She turned to look at James as she stuffed her mobile back into her pocket. 'Fen'll be outside in a sec. Go wait outside, I'm just going to go see if there's any food left in the kitchen.'

James nodded and Lily turned on her heel, walked swiftly towards the back of the house.

The kitchen was empty save a few bottles of water and granola bars left over from filming the night before, and though Lily wasn't exactly keen on those options, she swiped them into her bag.

She'd rather have breakfast she didn't exactly like than not have breakfast at all.

Their car was there when she met James outside, and Lily was pleased to see that it was Aidan driving them again.

She smiled at Benjy before she caught Aidan's gaze in the mirror. 'Nice seeing you again, Aidan.'

'And you, Lil. Make it to the meeting alright?'

Lily laughed and James shot her a confused look as he slid in beside her and pulled the door shut. Lily heard James quietly greet Benjy as she shifted over towards the other side of the car so she was out of frame.

'Yeah, I did. Thanks to those coffees, no one was any the wiser.'

'I knew you'd be fine, Lil. You're always charming your way out of all kinds of trouble. No way they could yell at you.'

Lily felt her face go hot and Aidan switched his attention to James. 'Good morning, Mr Potter. Hope you're well.'

'James, Aidan, please.' James smiled at Aidan's reflection in the mirror. 'And yeah, I'm alright. Could've done with a bit more sleep, but you know. How're you?'

James, Aidan, and Benjy started chatting, about rugby, football, and other things Lily knew existed but couldn't bring herself to care about, and so she turned in her seat, tried to take in the last bits of the island. Lily watched the countryside slip past in the car window, the wider village roads narrowing to single lane, country roads with high, wild hedges on either side. She'd hoped that they would travel down the coast on the way to the airport, that they'd cobble together a path that got them at least most of the way, but they went back the same way they'd came, down the centre of the island that gave her a view of distant houses and little else.

She cracked the window just a bit, let in the fresh, salty air, and the sun crept in through the gap and warmed her face, and she was so inexplicably happy in that moment, in the car with James, wind in her hair, sun on her skin.

She turned to look at him and found him watching her.

That look was on his face again, that desperately even look, but there was a warmth in his eyes that she hadn't expected. He looked happy. Happy and something that she couldn't quite put her finger on.

She wanted to ask him, probably should have asked him, but she just smiled at him, a bright, shining smile before she turned and looked out the window again.

She didn't let herself turn around to confirm it, but she thought she caught James smiling back out of the corner of her eye as she looked away.


	19. Chapter 18

When they touched down in Inverness a few hours later, Lily's exhaustion hit her like a wave.

It had been like this last year, too, the third week slump. There was nothing more for it except to battle through it, and even though she knew that, it didn't make it any easier in the interim.

Her body would eventually adjust to too little sleep, would get used to her schedule shifting around by a few hours every few days — it would click and then filming would be over and then she could collapse into her bed for a week.

That reminder was going to keep her going.

James, too, seemed a bit more tired than usual, though Lily suspected that was more because he'd been up filming in the early hours of the morning than it was anything else.

Benjy was the only one who looked rested, but Lily figured she couldn't hold that against him.

They chatted on and off as they moved through the airport, Lily, James, and Benjy, but by the time they got to the car, Lily and James had exhausted themselves beyond the point of conversation. They sat quietly in the back for the duration of the drive, James with his head back against the seat, eyes closed, and Lily with her gaze turned towards the window as she tried to ignore the fact that James was seated closer to her than he normally was and his knee was pressed against hers (and that Benjy was looking at her intently because he wanted her to make eye contact with him).

The place they'd rented this week, a literal castle, was about an hour outside the airport, and the drive couldn't have been more different than the one they'd taken a few hours before. Where Greece had been long, greenish-brown flats, Inverness was a dark, lush, rolling green. The sun was gone, too, but if Lily was honest, she didn't really miss it _too_ much.

She'd gone through more suncream in the last week and a half than she had in the last year combined.

She hadn't been back to Scotland since she graduated from uni, and she was surprised at the wave of nostalgia that rolled through her as they drove. Inverness had been the star of the first film she'd made in school. She could barely remember the details now, only really remembered flashes of what that weekend had been like — the four hour train ride north from Edinburgh, the tiny room she'd shared with her boyfriend, the fact that it was their first holiday together.

They didn't last long after that, but it had been so fun at the time.

It had amazed her how different it had been from Edinburgh — how small the city was, how metropolitan Edinburgh had seemed when she'd gotten home. She hadn't come back north more than twice the entire time she'd gone to uni, but there was something about the peace she'd always found there that she found really appealing.

She highly doubted that she would be finding much peace this time around, though.

When they arrived at the castle late that afternoon, Lily reached across to nudge James lightly in the arm.

'James. We're here.'

He groaned, shifted in his seat a bit, but he didn't open his eyes.

Lily laughed. 'Come on. There's a bed in there.'

James opened one eye, raised an eyebrow at her. 'Are you propositioning me?'

Lily saw Benjy still out of the corner of her eye and she flushed. 'I -— We just need to go over a few things and then you can go to sleep. After Benjy and I leave.'

James sighed heavily as he pulled himself up in his seat. 'That's a shame. I was hoping you were propositioning me.'

Lily smacked the back of his elbow and James grinned at her. He opened the door, stepped out onto the loose gravel drive, and Lily heard him gasp as he turned around and took in the castle he was staying in this week.

He whipped back around and looked at her as she climbed out of the car. 'This is where I'm staying?!'

She nodded, walked around the back of the car and opened the boot to grab their bags. 'Yeah. Nice, eh?'

The place they'd chosen for this week of filming was probably one of Lily's favourites off the entire schedule. It was massive, absolutely bloody massive, and the walls were a rough, weathered stone. It was, honestly, a bit much, but she'd known from the moment she'd seen it online that this would be the perfect place to host the show this week.

It had led Peter to some less than desirable conclusions about what they should get James to do during one of the group dates this week, but she hadn't exactly expected anything less. And, no matter how obnoxious Peter had gotten, Lily thought that it was at least a little bit worth it if they were going to get to film here.

'It's — holy shit.'

'Yeah, I know.'

'Do I need all this space? Why's it so big?'

'It's mostly for appearances,' Lily grabbed James' case out of the back and handed it across to him. 'But we've got room for the ceremony, production, all the usual shit. And your one on one date is here this time.'

'It is?'

Lily nodded. 'Yeah. Castle dinner, remember?'

Lily shut the boot and they started up the gravel drive towards the house, James in front, Lily and Benjy following along behind.

James turned to look at them as he walked. 'Where are you staying? Where are any of you staying? It was a _drive_ from town to — why've you got your bags?'

Lily bit her lip to hide her smile. 'We've rented another castle about a half an hour from here for the contestants. We're breaking production into two, so everyone is either sleeping here or in the contestants' place.'

'You're sleeping here?'

'Yeah,' they climbed the stairs to the front door, and James pushed it open, walked inside. 'I'll be sleeping just down the hall.'

Though the outside still looked like something out of a Waverley novel, the interior had clearly seen a number of renovations through the years. The interior walls had long since been plastered over and smoothed, the floors were a dark, gleaming hardwood instead of whatever they might've been when this place was first built.

It was undeniably beautiful, this place, but still, Lily couldn't decide if she liked it or not.

The house was bustling with energy when they stepped into the entry and James closed the door behind them. A few people stopped to say hi to them as they moved about, but most everyone went about their work, setting up lights, covering wires, sound checking the place. Benjy sighed as they shut the door behind them and Lily turned, arched her eyebrow at him.

'I'm going to get unpacked,' he said, shutting off the camera and starting to strip off his gear. 'There's no point trying to film with everyone running around like that. The noise alone —'

Lily nodded. 'We'll get a diary later this afternoon?'

Benjy shrugged. 'We can figure it out later. You look like you need a fucking break anyway, Lil. Don't worry about it.'

He smiled at her, a warm, friendly smile for the first time in days, and Lily felt herself smile in return. 'Alright.'

Benjy resumed pulling off his camera gear and Lily started across the room, careful to step over the wires that hadn't yet been taped down, and started up the stairs.

James' room, assuming she was remembering the email Mary had sent her a few hours ago correctly, was the large room at the end of the long corridor to the right. She felt James close behind her as she opened the door, heard him gasp when they stepped inside.

'This is mad.'

It was, actually, a bit mad.

James' room this week was large, almost absurdly so.

Like the rest of the house, the interior had been updated — only the rough stone along the exterior walls hinted at what this room might've once been. But even still, it was clear that updates had been made — the floors were the same rich wood that ran throughout the house and there was a row of tall, broad windows along the far wall that most certainly weren't original.

James dropped his bag inside the door and headed immediately towards the bed in the centre of the room.

He fell backwards onto the bed and groaned the minute he hit the mattress.

'I could fall asleep right now. Can I go to sleep right now?'

Lily dropped her bag beside his, walked a bit further into the room and leaned up against the chest of drawers.

'In a minute. I want to go over the schedule first.'

James picked his head up off the bed. 'Do we have to?'

'Yes.'

James groaned as he dropped his head. 'Can we take a nap first?'

Lily laughed. 'No.'

James patted the spot on the bed beside him. 'Come lie down with me, Evans.'

'I'm not going to lie down with you, James. We'll fall asleep.'

That was what she was going to keep telling herself, anyway.

'Come sit with me, then. You're too far away.'

Lily sighed, pushed off the chest of drawers, and smiled to herself as she crossed the room. The bed was higher than she realised, and she had to boost herself up onto her toes to slide back onto the mattress.

James turned onto his side as she settled in, curled his arm under his head to prop it up a bit. He opened his eyes then, caught the last bit of the smile on Lily's face.

'Hey.' His voice was low, a bit rough, and her stomach knotted up at the sound.

'Hey.'

He looked at her for a long moment, and Lily felt her breath catch in her chest when she watched his eyes darken as he looked at her. She'd thought, maybe, that it was the room, that a sun had gone behind a cloud outside and cast a shadow, but then his eyes left hers and began wandering slowly over her features, and there was no mistaking the way that her stomach was twisting in on itself as he looked at her.

He swallowed hard and Lily watched his Adam's apple bob in his throat.

He was looking at her with an intensity that she'd never seen from him, and she would give anything to know what he was thinking because the expression on his face was going to be one that she thought about an awful lot when she was alone in her room at night.

But really, he couldn't be looking at her like that right now because her exhaustion had worn her willpower incredibly thin.

He seemed to snap out of whatever he'd been thinking, though, because when his eyes met hers again, they were soft and tired like they had been when they'd first walked into the room. He re-adjusted his head on his arm and smiled sleepily up at her.

'Alright, Evans. Let's hear that schedule.'

She pulled in a long, trembling breath and cleared her throat.

'Tomorrow we've got Isle of Skye — we'll have to get an early start, but it's just going to be a big group picnic, and you can always sleep on the drive up.'

James nodded and Lily continued. 'Saturday will be the highland games —' James groaned over her, but Lily ignored him and continued. 'The contestants will be coming over here round eleven. We're just going to host them behind our place because we've got plenty of space and didn't see the point in dragging you all into a bus and driving to another location.

'And then Sunday is the castle dinner —'

'"Dinner".' James put quotes around it with his free hand and Lily sighed.

'Yes, I know. Anyway, have you got any questions?'

'Am I ever going to go on a date on this show where they let me eat?'

Lily nudged the bit of his leg dangling over the side of the bed with her foot. 'No. We don't want to catch you making chewing sounds or making any stupid faces.'

James touched his free hand to his chest. 'Excuse me, Evans. I look _insanely_ handsome when I eat.'

'Right.'

'Didn't I look handsome when we got lunch together, eh? That first time we met?'

Lily was torn between surprise at the fact that he'd brought that up and annoyance at the fact that he was absolutely right.

'Well, you didn't have a mic on you, then, so I didn't have to hear you chew.'

James laughed. 'But I was handsome, though?'

'You know you're handsome, why do you need me to confirm it for you?'

'Because I want to hear you say it.' The teasing tone was gone from his voice now, and he was looking at her like he had been when she'd first sat down beside him.

'Yes, James,' she was almost embarrassed at how breathy she sounded, was almost annoyed by how obvious she was making herself and her feelings, but the look that crossed his face as she spoke wiped out every other thought until all she was thinking about was getting as close to him as she could possibly get.

'You're incredibly handsome.'

A slow smirk crept onto his lips. 'You really think so, Evans?'

She wanted to smile back at him, wanted to look like she was joking around, but her voice was serious when she said, 'Yeah, I really do.'

Why her own body was sometimes intent on betraying her she had no idea.

But James — she thought that if he realised how serious she was, if he realised that there might be more to the way that she felt about him, he would put distance between them. He would run the other way. So when he dropped his free hand down into the space between them and started leaning closer to her, Lily was sure that James either had no idea that she was feeling the way she was feeling or, and she wasn't sure how she was feeling about this just yet, he was feeling something similar.

He was just reaching over and brushing his fingers against hers when someone spoke from the doorway.

'Lil — oh.'

Lily snapped up, yanked her hand away as she turned and faced the door.

Marlene was standing just inside the door to James' room, a door, Lily now realised, they'd left completely open.

Anyone could have seen them.

Anyone could have heard them.

Lily slid off the end of the bed and took a few steps back. 'James and I were just going over the schedule for this week.'

To her credit, Marlene didn't say anything to contradict what was, obviously, a very partial truth. She just nodded. 'I wanted to see if you wanted anything for dinner. We're just ordering in tonight, no one feels like going out.'

'You're staying here, too?'

''Course. How was I supposed to stay in the contestant house when I knew that you were going to be over here? And anyway, this house is nice and quiet. The contestant house is a loud fucking mess.'

Lily laughed. 'Why doesn't that surprise me?'

'Because Laura is a fucking menace?'

Lily snorted. 'Has her reign of terror started already?'

Marlene nodded. 'Yup. We can talk more about it later —'

'I want to hear what's been going on.' James had sat up while Lily and Marlene had been talking. Lily had been careful to avoid looking at him in front of Marlene because she wasn't sure what Marlene would be able to pick up on if she had let herself look at him.

Marlene was always too observant for Lily's own good.

Marlene shot Lily a look before she turned to look at James. 'We — I don't know that we should really go into all this.'

Lily knew that Marlene wanted her to agree, to tell James that they shouldn't let what was happening in the contestant house cloud his judgment, but if they were capturing everything happening over at the contestant house on camera (and Lily was positive that they were), this stuff would all be presented to the audience when they started airing in a few months. James needed to know what was going on over there or he was going to look like an even bigger arsehole than he already was for keeping Laura on.

Telling him the truth wasn't going to change the fact that they had to keep her on until Barcelona, but it could affect the way that James behaved whenever she was around.

'I think it'll be fine,' Lily said. 'He's just going to badger it out of me anyway, so we might as well just talk about it now.'

Marlene looked at her again, and Lily had the distinct impression that she was being x-rayed.

'Alright,' she said after a moment, 'if you're sure.' She stepped further into the room and shut the door behind her.

'Apparently,' Marlene said, walking over and leaning up against the chest of drawers where Lily had been a few minutes before, 'Laura has been a complete terror since the moment they got to the house.

'She demanded a single room despite the fact that all the women are supposed to share, started complaining that the food they'd had brought in for lunch was "peasant food", and _then_ she started stomping around talking about how glad she was that "that secret lesbian" was finally gone because "only _certain_ women deserve James' attention".'

It was like Lily's brain had stuttered to a halt. She looked at James, and the expression on his face had to mirror the one on her own. She turned to Marlene. 'What the fuck.'

'Yeah,' Marlene laughed sarcastically, brushed a piece of hair out of her eyes, 'you can imagine how pleased everyone was about that. Me in particular. Loved that certain women bit.'

'I — Mar, there has to be something that we can do. This is fucking ridiculous.'

'I re-read her contract after I heard the lesbian comment. She's not posing a physical threat to herself or anyone else on the show, so we don't have the legal right to kick her off.'

James frowned at Marlene. 'Sarah _just_ tried to kick her arse last week.'

'If we went that route, though, that would only end up with Sarah going home. There's really nothing that we can do until she does something that physically threatens a member of the cast or crew. And judging by how she's been carrying herself through this so far, I think that she knows that.'

'So you think Marc told her where to draw the line?' Lily said.

'I don't want to necessarily jump right to throwing Marc under the bus —'

'But who else would have told her?' Lily said. 'Who else would have said "hey, you get to be a complete fucking twat to everyone, but as long as you stop _just_ shy of actually hitting someone, you're safe"?'

Marlene groaned. 'I — Lil, I don't know. I just know that this is what we're dealing with now. It doesn't really matter who told her to act like this or why she's doing it. The fact is that she _is_ and we need to find a way to keep a handle on it.'

'Is there any way that we can limit the amount of time that this stuff ends up on air?' James asked. 'Maybe cut out the incentive for her?'

Marlene sighed. 'That only works if that's what she's after. And anyway, Peter is keen on getting her in as many shots as he can while she's still here. He's got a camera following her all the time over at the contestant house.'

Lily pressed the heel of her palm into her forehead. 'I mean, I get that she's a great villain, but this is — I mean, this is next level.'

'In that she's actually as terrible as she's going to seem on tv?' James asked

Lily nodded. Marlene sighed again. 'Look. We've only got two more weeks after this. I'll put some pressure on Peter to back off with the cameras and see if that deters her a bit. If it doesn't, we'll just have a find a way to deal with it.'

'But she's — next week is my family,' James looked appalled. 'I don't want them to meet her.'

'Unfortunately, there isn't much we can do. Unless she physically attacks someone this week, she's going on your hometown week.'

James didn't seem to have anything to say to that, just groaned and let his head fall back onto the mattress. Marlene used the opportunity to shoot Lily a significant look and said, 'Alright, well I'm going to go get settled in. I'll let you know when the takeaway gets here, yeah?'

Lily nodded. 'Yeah, alright.'

Marlene left the room, and it didn't escape Lily's notice that she didn't bother to close the door on her way out.

She suppressed a sigh as she turned back to James. 'Alright, any questions about your schedule for this week?'

James picked his head up again, looked at her for a moment.

'No, I don't think so.'

'Great. I'll, uh — I'll let you get settled, then.'

James frowned. 'Where are you going?'

'I've got to go unpack my bag. And then I have to go find Mary, go over some admin things. Nothing very exciting.'

She started to cross the room and James sat up completely. 'Do you want to hang out when the takeaway gets here? Watch a movie or something? I know we have to do my diary at some point, but maybe after?'

'I — I mean, I don't know, I'll have to see what's going on then.'

James didn't bother to hide that fact that he was disappointed — the look on his face _alone_ was enough to make her want to change her answer, but he didn't try to guilt her into it.

'Alright. Well, if you find yourself with nothing to do and fancy catching a film in here with me, I'd love to hang out.'

Lily walked the rest of the way towards the door, grabbed the handle of her suitcase as she turned around and smiled at him.

'Alright. I'll let you know once the takeaway gets here?'

James nodded. 'Sounds perfect.'

And though she would much rather have continued to stay in James' room and talk about nothing for the rest of the afternoon, Lily turned on her heel and walked out before the temptation became too much to resist.

She pulled the door shut behind her and started down the corridor, the roll of her case's wheels against the hardwood echoing around her. James' room was further away than Lily realised from the wing where the crew was staying, and it took her a decent amount of time to make it to the proper side of the building (and even longer to find her door, despite the fact that they all had small pieces of paper with their names on stuck to the doorframe).

Her room was at the far end of the opposite wing — something that, Lily thought, was probably for the best — and she slid her bag inside before walking back a few doors to the one that had been marked with Marlene's name. Lily didn't bother knocking on Marlene's door when she arrived, just walked in swiftly and shut the door behind her with a gentle click.

'What was that look about in there?'

'Oh, Lily.' Marlene was sitting on her bed, taking clothes out of her case and readjusting the fold before stacking them neatly at the foot of the bed. 'Are we really going to play this game?'

'What game?'

'Lily, come on.'

'What?!'

Lily was glad that there didn't seem to be anyone in their side of the house just yet, because there was no way that this was going to end well if Lily was already sort of shouting.

'I walked in on you — '

Lily crossed her arms. 'You did not _walk in_ on us!'

Marlene scoffed. 'I walked in on you practically holding hands and lying on his bed.'

'First of all, _he_ was lying on the bed. He was lying on the bed when you were in the room, too. He's tired. And second, we weren't holding hands.'

'He was _going_ to hold your hand, then, which is basically the same thing.'

'It is not even remotely the same thing.'

'I — okay, this is nonsense. Lily, just tell me what was going on in there.'

'Nothing!'

At least, she'd thought it had been nothing. She'd thought it had been nothing more outside of her own perverted thoughts whenever James was around, but then he _had_ looked like he was going to take her hand and the way he'd looked at her when they were on his bed —

Marlene raised her eyebrows. 'Do you really expect me to believe that based on what I saw when I walked into the room? Which, by the way, you should have been more careful about.'

'There was nothing to be careful about because there was nothing going on,' Lily hissed.

— maybe it _had been_ nothing, but it didn't seem like it was nothing anymore.

Not that she could necessarily walk up to James and ask him. No matter how much she wanted to, that wasn't an option.

'Were you _at_ the meeting we had the morning? Did you _listen_ to anything that we said?'

'You don't need to talk to me like I'm a fucking child, Marlene,' Lily snapped.

'I'm not —'

'You are.'

'Well, alright then!' Marlene threw her hands up. 'But Lily, I mean — come _on._ I walked into that room, clearly right into the middle of something! We just had a conversation about his contract _this fucking morning._ How do you expect me to react?'

'I expect you to believe me when I say that nothing's going on!'

'I believe you when you say that you aren't _acting_ on anything. But I don't think that you're being honest with me _or_ yourself when you say that nothing is going on between the two of you!'

Lily opened her mouth to speak, but Marlene cut across her before Lily could say anything. 'I know that I was teasing you about liking him before we left, because he's fit and kind and, honestly, what's not to like, but that? In there? Lily, that look on your face was more than that. And he was looking back at you with the same lovesick look on his face.'

Lily was quiet for a long moment before she breathed a heavy sighed. Her shoulders — she hadn't realised they were so damn tense — relaxed and she dipped her head a bit.

'I've got it under control. My… my feelings for him are under control. I'm not going to act on them and, eventually, I'll get over them, and then it'll be fine.'

'I'm not so sure that that's the case.'

Lily furrowed her brow. 'What do you mean?'

'I mean that — I don't think you're alone in this. Whatever _this_ is. He's clearly got feelings for you, too.'

'I — fine, then, I'll talk to him again.'

Marlene nodded. 'You should. He — I mean, his contract, Lily. Your _job_. A fling just wouldn't be worth all the trouble it would cause.'

Lily tried not to bristle at the word "fling", tried not to let herself get angry about it again. Because, really, she knew that Marlene was right and there was no sense arguing with her about it.

'No, you're right,' Lily said, and she hoped she didn't sound as defeated as she felt. 'I'll talk to him. I don't know what I'll say, but I'll figure it out.'

Marlene nodded, and Lily stood there for a moment, watched her continue to fold her clothes until her case was completely empty. When Marlene pushed herself up off the end of her bed, Lily seemed to come to.

'I'll let you get to it. I should go find Mary, anyway. See if we can't go over the plan for this week one more time. And Benjy and I have to get a diary at some point….'

'Come up when the food gets here,' Marlene said. 'We'll watch an old Bake Off.'

Lily recognised an olive branch when she saw one, and rather than continue to dig her heels in and be upset, Lily smiled. 'How do you know there will be an old Bake Off on?'

Marlene shrugged. 'There's always an old Bake Off on.'

Lily laughed. 'Good point. Alright, I'll see you then.'

Lily closed the door to Marlene's room softly behind her, hesitated for a moment before she turned and started back up the corridor towards her room.


	20. Chapter 19

**So I was editing this in prep for a birthday post on Wednesday and then I just wanted to post it now.**

 **So here it is.**

 **Also, I combined the next two chapters, so we're going to end on a really, really good note on Wednesday... I CAN'T WAIT**

* * *

When Lily woke up the next morning, she'd managed to successfully shove the events of the night before to the back of her mind.

She was going to get her feelings for James under control. There was nothing going on outside of Lily's misplaced attraction and, really, there was no need to talk to James about feelings that he obviously didn't have for her. He'd just been tired last night and he was _always_ kind of affectionate. To bring it up would just make it awkward, and the last thing that Lily wanted was to make her working relationship with James awkward unnecessarily.

Everything was fine.

The sun still wasn't up when Lily pulled herself up out of bed, and though she would normally have burrowed back under the blankets and refused to surface for at least a few more hours, they had quite a drive ahead of them today.

Lily couldn't remember why it had seemed like such a good idea to schedule the nightmarish, wake-up-before-dawn group date for the day after they'd travelled, and now she had half a mind to go back in time and kick her own arse.

She dressed in the dark, sprayed an ungodly amount of dry shampoo into her hair, and pulled it up into a passably decent ponytail. She checked her mobile to note the time (four fucking fifty), and stuffed it into her jeans pocket before she crossed her room to the door.

She crept as quietly as she could down the hall, silently cursing whoever had drawn up the room assignments and stuck her in a room at the far end of the fucking universe. There wasn't much time before they had to leave, so Lily moved as quickly as she could through the corridor towards James' room, careful to make as little noise as possible.

She hit a few creaky floorboards along the way, but they weren't so loud that she worried about waking anyone, especially at this hour.

She didn't bother knocking on James' door when she arrived (he wasn't going to answer anyway) — she just turned the knob quietly, pushed open the door, and slid inside.

James was, as Lily had expected, still dead asleep. He had one leg dangling over the side of the bed and the sheets were only partially covering the rest of him.

She didn't even notice the fact that he was half dressed.

Lily was careful to leave the door open as she crossed the room. She walked softly across the floor until she was a few feet away from his bed and whispered his name.

He didn't stir, so Lily stepped closer, got a little louder.

'James. Wake up.'

Nothing.

They really didn't have time for this.

Lily stepped forward, leaned over, and gave his shoulder a hard shove. James groaned and shifted under the blankets, murmured something that Lily couldn't catch.

'Get up, James, we're going to be late again.'

James pulled the pillow out from under his head and covered his eyes. 'I don't wanna.'

Lily tugged the pillow off his head and tossed it to the other side of the bed. 'Don't make me shove you again.'

James groaned, louder this time, and his hand started groping around on the sheets before he pushed himself up to sitting.

His hair. His hair was a complete disaster.

Alice was going to kill her.

'Why do I have to get up so early?' James rubbed at his eyes, yawned, and started feeling around his bedside table for his glasses.

'We've got a bit of a drive to the Isle of Skye today,' Lily said, watching as James slid his glasses onto his face and he opened his eyes to look at her. 'We wanted to get an early jump on it.'

James groaned. 'Why the fuck did we want that?'

Lily bit her lip to hide her smile. 'You'll be thanking me tonight when we get back early.'

He smirked. 'I can think of more interesting things I'd like to thank you for, Evans.'

Ah. So he was awake then.

Lily rolled her eyes. 'Shut up. Can I trust that you're going to get up and get dressed if I leave you in here?'

James just yawned again and Lily looked at him pointedly.

'Yeah, yeah, yeah,' he said, waving off her disapproval. 'I'm getting up.'

Her mobile pinged from her pocket just as she turned to walk back out of the room. She pulled it out, frowning because who in the _fuck_ would be texting her at this hour, and saw a text from Benjy.

 _Making breakfast — want anything?_

Lily tapped out a quick reply ( _put hte kettle on please and grab whatever snacks you can find for the ride thanks x)_ and turned back around to make sure that James hadn't fallen back into bed.

He frowned comically at her renewed attention. 'I'm getting up, Evans, I swear.'

'You better.' She checked her mobile again for the time. 'We leave in five.'

'I don't even have time to eat?'

'Benjy's getting snacks.'

James huffed something that sounded like, 'Fine,' and Lily turned and walked out of the room.

Her mobile pinged again as she closed James door behind her.

 _Benjy Fenwick: In the car, your tea's on the counter — see you in five_

Lily replied quickly before she silenced her phone and set off down the stairs.

She could just hear James moving around his bedroom when she got into the kitchen, and so Lily allowed herself to relax a bit. She took a long drag of her tea and exhaled hard against the burning in her throat, before she grabbed two disposable travel cups off the stack over the sink and dropped a tea bag into each.

She wasn't really sure how James took his tea, so Lily just let it steep and figured she could tell James it was his when he got downstairs.

She had just pitched their teabags into the bin when she heard someone coming down the stairs, and, a moment later, James turned into the kitchen.

He was mid-yawn when he saw her, but he picked his hand up in greeting.

'That's yours,' Lily pointed at the cup on the counter before she threw back the rest of the tea in her mug and set it into the sink. 'I wasn't sure how you take it, so —'

James smiled at her, dropped a grateful hand on her shoulder before he crossed the kitchen. Lily went to walk out when James spoke again.

'Deadly strong and one sugar,' he said, grabbing a sugar packet from the box beside the cups and ripping it open, 'in case you were curious.'

Lily nodded slowly. 'Good to know.' She was quiet for a beat. 'Alright well, Benjy's already in the car, so just meet us there, okay?'

James nodded and Lily turned on her heel and walked swiftly towards the front door.

Benjy looked up when Lily opened the car door and slid in.

'Where's James?'

'He's coming,' Lily shifted to the seat furthest from the door so James wouldn't have to walk around. 'He just had to finish making his tea.'

When James walked out of the house a minute later, though, his hands were completely empty. He climbed into the back beside Lily, his head immediately falling back onto the headrest before Lily could so much as say anything. Lily looked up and caught Benjy's amused expression before she laughed, bumped her knee against James' as the driver began driving.

'Come on, James, it's not that early. Talk to me. Where's your tea?'

James groaned loudly in response, but he did turn his head so he was looking in her direction (or would be, if his eyes were open). Lily clicked her tongue at him. 'Oh come on, you baby, wake up. You should be used to this by now.'

James groaned again (louder), and leaned the rest of the way across the seat, rested his forehead on her shoulder.

Lily's heart immediately stopped beating.

They'd been close before, James' habit of slinging his arm around her shoulders immediately came to mind, but there was something wholly different about this that made it difficult for Lily to concentrate.

She could feel his breath on her skin.

She knew Benjy was watching them, but —

She was rapidly losing whatever cool she had (already an alarmingly low amount), and so she decided to tell herself that it didn't matter. That he'd touched her before and she could handle this without doing something stupid. She could sit here beside him and let him sleep and not think about kissing him.

And if she committed the feel of his hair brushing against her neck to memory, well, so be it.

Lily determinedly avoided Benjy's gaze as she shifted slightly to pull her mobile out of her jacket pocket, decided that she could at least read emails if she was going to sit in silence for the rest of their drive to the set that morning. James groaned into her neck when she moved and she breathed a laugh.

'Relax, you can stay there.'

James sighed his thanks and Lily bit back a smile as she opened up her emails.

She only looked up at Benjy once and his expression — contemplative and nonjudgmental — just made Lily even more confused.

They sat quietly for a half an hour, Lily skimming through email, Benjy scrolling through his phone, James' soft, quiet breath the only sound other than the sounds of the car itself. The car bumped a bit as it drove onto the bridge, and James shifted against her again, his nose pressing into her neck. His breath was hot against her skin and she shivered involuntarily. She felt James smile against her neck.

'Have I got you all flustered, Evans?'

His voice was still rough with sleep, but he was definitely amused now. She reached up and pushed his chest so that his forehead left her shoulder.

'Don't you wish,' she said, shooting him a look when he opened his eyes a bit to look at her. James smiled sleepily at her before he let his head drop back down onto her shoulder (Lily didn't bother fighting him).

'So what if I do, Evans?'

She rolled her eyes. 'Well that would be very stupid as you're on a programme intended to find you a wife.'

James sighed and, this time, Lily managed to suppress the shudder that threatened to move over her.

They arrived at the meeting point about an hour later. They pulled off into a small car park in Uig, the tiniest village Lily had ever seen in her life, and climbed out. The contestants, Lily noted, were all obviously tired, but they'd also clearly taken a bit of time to get themselves together that morning (a good thing, too, because they weren't afforded hair and makeup by Production until the final week) — Rachel's hair looked like it was freshly curled and Summer had a streak of bright blue eyeliner on.

Alice, meanwhile, had already swept over and started attempting to straighten James' hair.

'Sorry,' Lily said, smiling at her. 'You know how his hair gets.'

Alice grinned at her as she fluffed James' hair. 'No worries, love. A wilder look might be in the cards for today, though, huh? And,' she kissed the air in Lily's direction, 'good morning. How're you?'

'Tired,' Lily laughed.

Alice beamed as she pulled a spray bottle out of her pocket and started spritzing James' hair. 'Preaching to the choir.'

Alice only fussed with James' hair for a few minutes before she dabbed a bit of concealer under his eyes and deemed him set to film.

Their date today was a hike around the Quiraing followed by lunch and an afternoon in Portree, a fishing village about twenty miles away from Uig. Lily spent the day clambering along behind James, the camera crew, and the contestants — she was so far back to ensure she stayed out of shot that she could really only catch snatches of James' conversation as they walked.

Though Lily did hear James ask Sarah about her right hook — she had a proper laugh about that.

Despite the fact that everyone had been dragged out of bed before dawn, it seemed like another successful date. James got in some quality conversation time with women he hadn't yet had the opportunity to really talk to, the crew had managed to get some truly spectacular shots of the landscape, and they'd even (Lily suspected this might be James' favourite part) gotten to eat an actual meal when they got to Portree later that afternoon.

They'd cut the cameras and none of it was going to make it onto the show, but they'd gotten to _eat_.

The drive back to Inverness later that afternoon wasn't nearly as quiet as the drive to Skye had been that morning. Now that he was awake and fully fed, James was chatty the entire drive back to the house.

'I really need to start working out again,' James said, leaning back against the door so that he could grin at both Lily and Benjy. 'That — today! It was amazing!'

'Well, you're in luck,' Lily said. 'Tomorrow's the highland games, so you've got all kinds of shit you're going to be doing.'

James raised an eyebrow. 'Like what?'

'Throwing weights and lifting logs? I don't know, I don't really remember. They're setting it up today out in the fields behind the house if you really want to go have a look.'

James shook his head. 'No, I'd rather be surprised.'

When they got back to the house an hour later, Benjy immediately streaked off to his room to catch a nap ('If you tell anyone where I am, Lil, I'll kill you. I love you, but I'll kill you.'). Marlene had texted Lily on their drive back to get their takeaway orders and Lily, with very little else to do now that Benjy was taking a nap and she wasn't letting herself be alone with James, wandered off to Marlene's room.

Marlene was reclined on the bed when Lily walked in, an old episode of _Dinner Date_ on the television. Lily sighed heavily as she shut the door and Marlene looked up, smiled at her.

'Long day?'

Lily nodded and Marlene patted the space on the bed next to her. 'Come on, then.'

They sat quietly and watched Ravi read menus for a few minutes before Marlene turned to her. 'How did your conversation go with James yesterday?'

Lily stilled.

Fuck.

'I — it hasn't come up yet. He went to bed right after we finished filming the diary last night.'

Marlene gave her an exasperated look. 'Lily —'

'I'm going to do it tomorrow.' She didn't have any plans to do it tomorrow and Marlene could probably tell from the high-pitched, panicked way that Lily was talking about it, but Lily couldn't summon the energy to put in more effort than she already was. 'After the highland games. He should be well-rested after today anyway, we're back so early, so it should be fine.'

She was rambling. Marlene just studied her for a moment longer before she turned back to the television.

'Alright. As long as you do it this week.'

Fuck.


	21. Chapter 20

**I promised Blueandbronze13 a birthday chapter, so here we are. Happy birthday, my friend!**

 **Also, you can thank scaredofrobots for James' outfit in this chapter. I never knew I needed this until I had it.**

* * *

The next morning, Lily woke bright and early. _Too_ bright and early.

She'd hoped to have a bit more of a lie in, especially because she was still overwhelmingly tired after two sleepless nights in a row, but her room got _all_ the morning sun, and so there was very little that she could do when her room looked and felt like it had all the studio lights in the world crammed into it.

The contestants were due to be there around eleven that morning, and so while she could've gotten back in bed and buried her head under a pillow for at least another few hours, Lily knew when to give in and accept that she was going to have to find some way to be productive.

Unfortunately, she and Mary had already planned everything they'd needed to for this week, so there wasn't much left to think about but the conversation she had to have with James.

But it was far too early and she was far too uncaffeinated to even begin thinking about that.

And besides — maybe if she forgot about it, she wouldn't have to do it. Maybe it wouldn't be necessary. Marlene would probably kill her if she put it off another day, but maybe she wouldn't mind being dead.

She spent most of the early morning sketching out plans for hometown next week, and when she'd planned that out as far as she could, she resisted the urge to move on and start planning Barcelona, heeding her now angry and vocal stomach and pushing herself up out of bed instead.

It was just half seven when she stepped out into the corridor, still adjusting her dressing gown around her shoulders. She did her best to avoid all the creaky floorboards she'd found the morning before, and she was about to be impressed with herself when she rounded the corner by the stairs and nearly jumped out of her skin.

The noise that escaped her was somewhere between a squeak and a slightly strangled cry of surprise, and though it wasn't loud, it echoed in the empty house and made James whip around far more quickly that he should while he was on the stairs.

Lily chose not to notice the fact that James' dressing gown was undone and he wasn't wearing a shirt underneath.

'Jesus christ, Evans.' He pressed a hand to his chest and took a moment to gather himself as Lily started walking even more softly down the stairs to compensate for nearly screaming and waking everyone up.

'How are you so quiet?' she hissed as she met him on the stairs and they started down together. 'You're a fucking giant.'

James chuckled under his breath. 'Lots of practice.'

Lily raised an eyebrow at him as they moved through the entrance hall towards the back of the house. 'Why would you need to practise being quiet?'

'The football was actually a cover up,' he said, shooting her a grin. 'I'm really a spy for MI-6.'

'And a rubbish one at that,' she said, and James knocked her elbow with his as they walked into the kitchen.

'What are you doing up so early?' Now that they were a fair distance away from most of the people sleeping in the house, he let his voice get just a bit louder as he crossed the kitchen and grabbed the kettle off the base.

Lily sighed and started opening up cabinets, taking stock. Because town was an hour's drive, the PAs had done a bit of shopping on the way in to make sure that there was enough food to feed the crew over the next few days. There wasn't much that was all that exciting — it was mostly boxes of cereal, frozen pizzas, and protein shakes — but Lily would take what she could get of it meant that she didn't need to drive back to Inverness every goddamn day.

'My room gets all the sun,' she said as she grabbed out a box of muesli and started opening up more cabinets to find bowls. 'I worked for a little while, but —'

Her stomach growled loudly then and Lily flushed. 'My body was obviously tired of waiting to be fed.'

James laughed as he, too, started searching cabinets. 'I know the feeling. I'm all thrown off after yesterday.'

Lily held up the muesli. 'Want some?'

James nodded and grabbed two mugs out of the cupboard he'd just opened. 'Sure.'

They set about preparing breakfast, moving quietly around the kitchen as they searched for spoons and tea bags and sugar. She tried not to watch James too obviously as they orbited one another, tried not to look like she was trying to catch glimpses of his stomach as his dressing gown shifted around. Instead, she watched her hands as she made up their bowls, and if her eyes happened to slip to James when he knocked his spoon gently against the side of one of their mugs, then so be it.

She grabbed the milk off the counter where James left it, sloshed a generous amount over each of their bowls before she plucked James' off the counter and held it out towards him.

He grinned, held out her mug, and they swapped.

She took a sip of her tea and hummed happily as she grabbed her bowl off the worktop and they started towards the table.

James nodded towards the mug in her hand. 'That alright?'

Lily nodded, took another long drag. 'It's perfect,' she said, smiling at him as she set it down and picked up her spoon. 'How'd you know how I take my tea?'

'I'm observant.'

Lily lifted her spoon to her lips. 'Must be all that MI-6 training.'

James grinned. 'And you doubted me.'

Lily rolled her eyes and ate her cereal.

James smiled at her a moment longer before he lifted a bite of cereal to his lips. 'So what did you end up doing after we got back last night?'

Lily covered her mouth as she replied. 'Watched old _Dinner Date_ s with Marlene and had a chat. Nothing too exciting.'

James groaned. 'I should've popped over and hung out with you guys.'

'Why, what did you do?'

'Sat alone in bed and ate my curry.' James was quiet for a beat before he ran a hand through his hair and smiled a bit awkwardly. 'God, that sounds pathetic.'

Lily nodded. 'It does.'

They ate quietly for a few minutes, Lily listening for any signs of life from the rooms above through the whistle of the wind outside. She was sure that people would start waking up soon, and though she knew that there wasn't anything particularly incriminating about eating breakfast together, she was on edge after her conversations with Marlene last night and the night before.

Marlene was her best friend and more observant than most everyone she knew, but Benjy, too, knew about the way Lily felt, and while she didn't think that either of them would go around blathering about it to people…

If Marlene and Benjy knew and had suspected before Lily said anything, how many other people also suspected that there might be something more going on between her and James?

Lily cleared her throat, desperate to talk about anything and avoid spiralling out on her own thoughts, and James started. She smiled apologetically.

'So, uh — why are you awake?' she asked. 'I'm surprised you didn't sleep later after all that exercise yesterday.'

James chewed for a moment longer before he replied. 'Couldn't sleep.'

'Oh?'

He half shrugged. 'I just woke up, got to thinking, and couldn't get back to sleep.'

'What were you thinking about? Anything good?'

James looked up from his tea and caught her eye.

'Yeah,' he said, and his voice was low and soft and it went straight through her. 'Yeah, pretty good.'

She should talk to him now. She should say something about his contract now before — well, who knew what would happen, but she should talk to him before it got out of hand.

'Uh —'

'So —'

They both spoke at once, and Lily felt her cheeks flush violently. She ducked her head and grabbed her mug off the table and took another sip of her tea before she looked up at James again.

'You go on,' she said. 'I don't really know what I was going to say.'

'You sure?'

She waved her hand. 'Yeah, yeah, I'm sure. Like I said, I — I didn't have anything in mind.'

Coward.

James studied her for a moment before he nodded. 'Uh, okay. I was just going to ask about my contract, actually.'

Lily froze and James cleared his throat. 'If you have a copy of it or something? We both know that I never actually read it and I would like to have a read.'

Lily felt her shoulders tense. Why was he asking about his contract? What was he looking for? And shouldn't she have this chat with him, really have this chat with him, because now he'd brought it up and she didn't seem to have an excuse anymore?

Lily heard the floors creak overhead and she hastily rearranged her features into a lighter, easier expression.

'I still can't believe you didn't read it,' she said, and she made herself chuckle a bit.

James shrugged, finished off the rest of his muesli. 'My lawyer read it. She's never steered me wrong.'

'Still. It's — James, you should have read it. It's irresponsible not to have read it.'

'Anyway,' James swerved around the argument as he pushed himself to his feet, crossed the kitchen, and set the kettle boiling again before he started washing his bowl. 'I'm wondering if you have a copy of it that I can read. I want to know exactly what the language is, especially because I don't have a phone and can't talk with my lawyer about it.'

She laughed, and though it was too awkward and breathy to be her normal laugh, she hoped that James wouldn't notice. 'Back on the phone, are we?'

James grinned, set his bowl on the draining board. 'No, I'm mostly over the phone.'

He turned and leaned up against the worktop, and his dressing gown fell completely open. Lily hoped to god that she wasn't actually drooling looking at him, because she felt like she might be.

She listened for more sounds coming from upstairs to distract herself.

'I just want to read the contract, is all,' James said. 'I feel like I need to know just what I can and can't do moving forward.'

'Is there — I mean, is there something you want to do that I can just — we can talk about? Or set up a time to talk about? Rather than you having to read the whole thing?'

James shook his head. 'I really think I should just read the whole thing.'

Lily frowned. 'Why?'

'I need to know what my options are.'

The kettle clicked then, and Lily could hear the water boiling rapidly inside even from across the kitchen, and though she expected James to move, he just stood there, his eyes on hers, and for a moment, Lily felt like she couldn't breathe because the weight of his gaze was pressing on her chest and making it impossible.

After a long moment, James dropped his gaze as he turned back to the counter, grabbed the kettle, and poured water into his mug.

By the time the contestants arrived a few hours later, Lily had _mostly_ pulled herself together.

She'd made herself another cup of tea and scurried out of the kitchen just as Tom and Rob and a few other guys from the crew ambled in. She muttered something about how she needed to take a shower and put on mascara before she darted out, and James, for once, didn't follow her and try to continue the conversation.

And thank god, because she needed some time to figure out why he suddenly gave a shit about reading his contract.

Sure, it was completely within his rights to want to read it, and yes, she had a copy of it on her laptop, but why did he want to read it? Why now?

She agonised over it until she was showering and got a fuck ton of soap in her eye, and she figured that, maybe, she should concentrate on one thing at a time.

Besides, there were like thirty other people waiting to shower, and they would spend the rest of the day torturing her if she took too long.

Come ten, she was showered, dressed, her radio was clipped back on her hip, and she had managed to get herself to stop thinking about James and his contract for more than two seconds at a time, and so it was with a moderate amount of confidence that she slid through the corridor, now full of people moving in and out of their rooms and running downstairs, and walked over the James' room.

His door was closed when she arrived, and she knocked hard to make sure that he could hear her over the shouting and banging around downstairs. She barely heard him shout, 'Come in!' through the door, and Lily turned the knob, pushed open the door, and stepped inside.

And then she nearly had a heart attack.

Does he ever wear clothes? Ever?

He had a towel tied tight around his waist and was staring at the clothes on his bed when Lily walked in.

He turned around and frowned when the door clicked shut behind her. 'I can't wear this.'

Lily immediately rolled her eyes. 'Jesus christ, James, not again.'

She was not going to fight about this today. She was not going to have toga part two because he had agreed, _agreed_ , to wear this goddamn kilt, and she was not going to listen to it.

'No,' he shook his head, 'I just — the colours — Evans, my mum will _kill_ me if I'm on tv in this.'

'Wh — James, just fucking put the kilt on. Everyone will be here in an hour and we need to go over —'

James was shaking his head and Lily huffed. 'James —'

'It's not a problem with the kilt,' James said. 'Well, it is, but not how you think.'

Lily crossed her arms and arched an eyebrow at him. 'Let's hear it then.'

'It's the colour,' James said. 'The red —'

'You look great in red!'

James smirked and Lily frowned at him. 'Shut up.'

James' grin widened. 'Just admit that you think I'm fit, and —'

'Oh my god,' Lily held up her hand and James laughed. 'Just get to the fucking point about the kilt, James, because we really don't have that much time.'

'I told you already.' James shook his head a bit and sort of half shrugged. 'I can't wear it.'

' _Why_?' Lily said through gritted teeth. She was really trying not to kill him, really she was, but he was trying her fucking patience.

'Because the colours are wrong and my mother will literally flay me _alive_ if I wear any kilt on telly that isn't "the Potter clan colours".'

Lily just stared at him and James nodded. 'I know it sounds like I'm making this up, but I swear to you that I'm not.'

'But,' it was coming back to her now that she was thinking about it, 'Mary googled this when we were picking out things for this week and this came up. This _is_ Potter clan colours.'

James shook his head. 'Nope. Not according to my mother, anyway. She fought for _years_ to get grey and maroon recognised as our official tartan.'

'You're kidding.'

'Nope. Dad and I never understood why she cared so bloody much, especially because she's not even remotely Scottish, but with mum, the best approach is to just let her do what she's going to do.'

'So if you wear this —'

'Mum'll have my head. If I even _think_ about it, she'll try me for high bloody treason.'

'But James,' Lily raked her hand through her hair. 'You — where are we even going to find this tartan? Do they sell it near here?'

James nodded. 'I'd google it for you, but seeing as how I'm out of a phone —'

Lily held up her hand and James chuckled, but, thankfully, he knew well enough to fall silent.

'I'll have Mary run into town and see what she can find,' Lily pulled her mobile out of her pocket and started texting Mary. 'But if she can't find it, you're wearing this. Do you hear me?'

She shot James a stern look and he grinned. 'I like it when you boss me, Evans.'

' _James_.'

'Alright, alright. But you have to swear that you'll tell mum if I end up wearing the red.'

She rolled her eyes. 'Fine. And, by the way — when Mary wants to kill you for being difficult, I'm going to let her.'

'Please,' James sank down on the edge of the bed and Lily prayed to god that his towel would stay closed. 'Mac would never. She loves me.'

Lily snorted. 'Only because you're always flirting with her.'

'Nah. I only flirt with you, Evans.' He winked.

She completely ignored the way her heart had started hammering against her ribs.

'You're absurd.'

'-ly handsome?'

Lily's mobile dinged and she took the opportunity to dip out of their conversation without thinking of a retort.

 _Mary MacDonald: Headed out now — will send pics of what i find and james can tell me which is correct_

Lily tapped out a quick reply before she stuffed her mobile back into her pocket and she looked at James.

'Mary is headed into town now. She's going to text me some pictures of what she finds and you can pick the one that's closest to what you want.'

James shifted his weight on the bed and it took all of Lily's self control to keep her eyes on his face.

'She should just be able to go in and ask for the Potter tartan —'

'That's basically what we did the first time through this,' Lily said. 'They gave us that.' She pointed at the red and green tartan on the bed.

'Well, any shop worth their salt should know the proper design. Mum probably told everyone in the whole of bloody Scotland.'

James' mum, it turned out, _had_ told the whole of bloody Scotland, and so Mary was able to get the appropriate tartan and get back on set only an hour after they were supposed to start shooting.

The crew was less than pleased with Lily when she'd told them, but, as she reminded them a thousand times, there was very little that she could do at this point short of forcibly dressing James and dragging him out of his bedroom.

Benjy muttered something about how the opposite of that suggestion probably sounded more appealing to her as he walked past, and Lily nudged him hard in the ribs.

The delay, though, wasn't the end of the world — the producers were able to rangle their contestants into interviews, they set up some scenic shots, and so, by the time that James came striding out of the back of the castle just gone noon, everyone had been sufficiently distracted from the fact that they'd been quite keen on killing him an hour earlier.

The contestants, each in kilts of their own (though their kilts were significantly shorter than Lily thought strictly necessary), had been gathered in the centre of the field, well away from the stations the crew had organised for each event they were planning on running. Once they noticed James walking down the hill, though, they all immediately started moving closer to him. While the others largely milled around and talked amongst themselves while they waited for James to come to them, Laura, naturally, darted off the moment she'd noticed him coming down the hill and she immediately launched herself into James' arms.

James' bare arms.

His outfit this week wasn't as revealing as it had been back in Greece (hardly a feat, as his outfit in Greece was little more than an artfully tied sheet), but damn if there wasn't something about it. His kilt was fine, it fell just to his knees and the colour looked amazing on him, but it was the top that drew Lily's eye more than anything. The black tank top was tucked into the kilt and, sleeveless as it was, Lily had an excellent view of his arms.

His biceps. His _forearms._

She had never appreciated them enough.

James put his hands on Laura's elbows and moved her arms from around his neck, said something that Lily couldn't hear from this distance. Laura laughed, but when she turned to walk away, there was a distinctly annoyed look on her face that Lily didn't miss.

James waved at everyone else standing in the centre of the field, but it was obvious, as he approached, that he wasn't walking over to them first. He smiled at Lily as he headed towards her, gestured down at himself when he was close enough that she could hear him without him having to speak up.

'What do you think? Worth the delay?'

Yes.

Lily half shrugged. 'You're alright.'

James laughed. 'Liar.'

Lily grinned. 'You're right, you're hideous.'

James shook his head at her and Lily pretended not to notice the way his tongue wetted his bottom lip. He'd just opened his mouth to say something when Jax shouted at him from behind the cameras a bit away from them.

'Potter!'

James whipped around and looked at him. Jax didn't look furious, but Lily could tell that he wasn't exactly happy either.

'You can chit chat with Lil all you want when this is over. Get your arse over here.'

Lily hoped she wasn't as flushed as she felt when James turned back to her. 'Guess we'll have to continue this later.'

And before Lily could say anything else, James turned on his heel and jogged off to the group of contestants on the other side of the line of cameras.

Lily spent the next few hours hovering around the edge of the set. She didn't chat much, just exchanged a few words here and there with whoever was nearby — she was far more interested (and so, it seemed was everyone else) watching the contestants try to compete in the games.

No one had seemed particularly intimidated by what was being asked of them when they'd arrived on set at eleven that morning — they'd all said the games seemed fairly simple and had immediately begun talking about how easy it was all going to be — and there was something almost unbearably hilarious about watching all that fall apart in real time.

Lily hoped to _god_ they'd gotten some of the contestants talking about just how easy they thought everything was going to be in their pre-games diaries. The contrast in the final cut would be too much.

The sheaf toss wasn't so bad — they all managed to get through it without too much grumbling — the weight throw was more difficult, but not altogether impossible. The caber toss, though — Lily would remember that event for the rest of her life.

They hadn't even picked anything properly heavy for the contestants to use, had basically picked _sticks_ compared to the photographs they'd found online of what the cabers usually looked like, but no one, _no one,_ was able to figure out how to pick up, let alone throw the damn things, and Lily was in stitches.

Despite the difficulty, though, most everyone seemed to have fun. Whether it was genuine fun or "putting on a good face for James" fun was going to take a bit of sorting out, but James was slowly making his way through conversations with each of the women, and Lily was sure he was coming to his own conclusions.

He avoided Laura as much as he thought he could get away with — Lily laughed under her breathe every time Jax made him re-shoot something something with her because "his face didn't look right" — but he spent a fair bit of time talking to most everyone else.

He spent a few minutes with Liza when he'd first arrived, and Lily thought she'd have to chastise him for spending so much time with the one woman there that he'd already spent a significant amount of time with, but he'd moved on rather easily and hadn't appeared to piss Liza off in the process.

Lily watched as he chatted with Anja and Sian and Olivia, watched the way he helped Saoirse get her hold on the caber just right. Lily tried not to notice James' hand on Saoirse's elbow as he helped her stand, tried not to focus on how close he'd started standing beside people when he spoke to them, the way that his mouth hitched up into that light, teasing smile as they bantered back and forth.

She tried not to notice.

And all the time, she was waiting for the drama to unfold, for some of the contestants to get jealous, seeing him like that with the other women, or for some of them to get angry because they hadn't had enough time with him — she kept waiting for it, was sure that the producers opposite her were encouraging it, but, from what Lily could tell, it never came. James floated easily between them, often talking to two or three people at a time in a way that made it difficult to think that he was singling anyone out.

He was better at this than he knew.

Lily wasn't sure how she felt about that.

When the games ended a few hours later, everyone, cast and crew alike, was bloody well exhausted. Everyone had a bit of mud on them, everyone was groaning about muscle aches, and everyone was ready to go home and sleep for the next week.

Everyone except James who bounded up to the front with a stupidly wide smile on his face when the last competition had finally ended.

'Did you guys have fun today?!'

The contestants all smiled back at him and did their best to cheer enthusiastically, but there was no way they were hiding their exhaustion at this point.

James laughed. 'Sounds like I wore you all out.'

James spoke for a few seconds, thanked them for coming, reminded them that he'd see them on Monday for the ceremony, before the cameras cut. Lily had expected him to come striding back across the lawn towards her — like he had done for every date so far — but this time, James lingered in the centre of the group of contestants and chatted amicably with them as the cameras rolled away.

It was a few minutes before he even started making his way over, and even then he was walking with Liza and Anja and Saoirse and they were laughing it up as they made their way over to where Lily stood.

Lily crossed her arms and waited.

It was a few more minutes before James finally looked over and noticed her standing there. She raised her eyebrows at him when they made eye contact, and James nodded, but held up a finger at her to indicate that he'd like one more minute.

Lily hoped the expression on her face didn't completely give her away.

All told, she was in an incredibly sour mood by the time that James finally broke away from the group and made his way towards her. He was grinning and that only made Lily's mood worse.

'Well,' James said as he reached her, 'how was it?'

He looked down and started brushing bits of grass off his kilt while he waited for her answer. After a few moments of silence, he looked up at her, a frown creasing his features when he noticed the look on her face.

'What?'

Lily shook her head. 'Nothing.'

'Yeah, it really looks like nothing.' James stepped closer to her, reached out and put a hand on her elbow. It was just the slightest bit of pressure against her skin, but she felt it everywhere.

'Come on. What's wrong?'

She shook her head. 'Nothing you need to worry about.'

James' frown deepened. 'Of course I need to worry about it. You're upset.'

'I'm not upset.' She shook his hand off her arm and she knew, now that her voice was tight and angry, that he was never going to believe what she was saying was true. 'I'm just tired.'

'Bollocks. You're upset about something. What is it?'

'It's stupid.'

'Try me.'

'No.'

James sighed and raked a hand through his hair. He stepped closer to her and Lily was suddenly viscerally aware of the fact that they were surrounded by cameras.

'Evans. How do you expect us to get anywhere if you won't talk to me?'

'I — James,' she pointed at his chest and then indicated his micpack. James hummed in acknowledgement and reached back behind him to unhook his microphone.

'Now will you talk to me?'

She shook her head. 'Not with all cameras here.'

'Let's go back up to the house, then.'

She'd been hoping that he would let her out of it, but that, apparently, was not going to happen. James, it seemed, could be just as stubborn as she was once he got into something.

Lily sighed heavily and hesitated for a moment before she reached down and unclipped her radio from her hip.

'Going off walkie.'

They walked back up to the house in silence.

James' fingers brushed against hers a few times as they walked, so lightly at first that she barely realised it. She thought, the first few times, that it might have been an accident, but then he ran his finger down the length of her index finger, and there was no mistaking it.

When she looked up, he was watching her.

Her breath fell out of her in a rush.

They still didn't speak as they carried on across the garden, didn't even look at one another as they walked. Lily just felt, from time to time, the brush of his skin against hers — sometimes it was James' doing, a few times it was hers.

She could feel the tension winding tighter in her stomach each time, and though she knew she should stop, she couldn't quite bring herself to do anything other than let her hand continue to swing, open, by her side.

It was a mistake, wanting this. It was a mistake.

It was a mistake and she didn't care.

It was a mistake and she _needed_ to care.

They walked through the back door and through the house, their feet leading them to the same place without, thankfully, having to talk about it.

She should say something, probably, before they got there, should set out their expectations, should make sure they were on the same page, but every time she opened her mouth to try, nothing came out and she couldn't seem to find the words to even begin to try.

And so she didn't say anything at all as they climbed the stairs and walked silently down the corridor towards his bedroom.


	22. Chapter 21

**see, I told you Sunday would be here soon x**

* * *

When James' bedroom door clicked shut behind them, the tension in Lily's gut peaked.

She was tottering on a knifepoint and she really wasn't sure which way she would go. She knew which way she wanted to fall.

Lily stayed by the door once they were inside, pressed her shoulders back into the wood like it was somehow going to remind her to behave. She'd been expecting — well, she hadn't really known what to expect, honestly, but she'd thought that James might stay beside her, might take her hand and pull her into the room. She'd thought he might encourage her to tip over the edge that she was just barely avoiding, but James took three large steps away from her the moment the door fell closed and leaned up against the dressing table opposite so he could look at her.

'Are you going to talk to me now?'

His voice was a bit of a shock after the length of silence between them. She cleared her throat.

'There's not really much to talk about.'

Liar.

'Evans.'

Lily pressed her lips together. Looked down at her hands.

She didn't want to get into this. Didn't want to have to explain this.

It would give too much away, telling him that she was insanely jealous, telling him that every time she watched him talking to the contestants, the knife in her gut twisted until it became impossible to ignore. It would give too much away to start telling him how much she hated watching him with them, and putting it into words, telling James — it would make her feelings for him real in a way that she wasn't ready to do yet. When it was Marlene or Benjy, Lily could pretend that it was a joke, but once she told James... she wouldn't be able to hide from it anymore once she told James.

'Lily?'

Lily looked up. He was looking at her again, that look on his face that made her stomach ache.

She swallowed.

'There's really nothing you want to talk about?'

Lily shook her head and James hummed, ran his tongue along his bottom lip. 'What if I have something I want to talk about?'

'The contestants?' It was out of her mouth before she could stop it and she hated how acidic it sounded.

James shifted against the dressing table, shook his head slowly. 'No.'

And it really hit her then, the way he was looking at her and the sound of his voice and the way his body was pointed at hers even halfway across the bloody room. His hints — the brush of his fingers against hers on the lawn, his knee against hers in the car, the arm around her shoulders as they walked — his hints became what they probably always were, but she'd been too stubborn to let herself understand them as James had meant them to be understood.

Oh god.

She pressed her shoulders more firmly against the door. 'James.'

'Lily.'

He didn't move. Neither of them moved, but a heaviness settled between them and it took all the effort in the world for Lily to keep her shoulders pressed against the door, to keep her from stepping across the room and closing the distance between them.

She wanted to run her hands down his chest. She wanted to feel his jaw in her hands. She wanted to press her lips against his.

She absolutely, without a doubt should not do that.

'Lily —'

She held up her hand and James immediately fell silent. 'I — James, I do have something we need to talk about.'

James nodded slowly. 'Alright.'

'Uh, so,' Lily cleared her throat and tried to shake off her nerves. 'You know how you asked about your contract the other day?'

'Yeah.'

'I don't have a copy of it yet, the contract, but I do need to talk to you about it.'

'Oh?' His expression was even, but Lily could hear the beginnings of something in his voice.

She swallowed hard against the nervous lump in her throat. 'Yeah.'

James held her gaze for a moment before he spoke. 'What about?'

'I just need to make sure that I was clear when I asked you about outside relationships in Greece. That you knew what I meant and that your answer hadn't changed.'

James braced his hands back against the dressing table and he studied her, tried to read her expression before he replied. 'Is there any particular reason you're asking me about this? Now, I mean?'

Because Marlene basically twisted Lily's arm until she agreed to say something? Because she and James have been getting closer and now it seemed like there was more there than there probably should be? Because Lily now spent, like, eighty percent of her time thinking about things that were entirely inappropriate and she really, _really_ should remedy this before something happened?

Because sometimes James looked at her with a look on his face that made Lily's chest ache and eventually it was going to impossible to resist.

Lily cleared her throat.

'I just need to make sure I was clear,' she said, 'because we — you — I mean —'

James leaned his weight back onto his arms and it took most everything Lily had to stop herself staring at James' biceps.

She looked down at her shoes instead.

'But why do you need to clear this up _now_? Did something change?'

There was something quietly hopeful in his voice, and it was impossible to look at him when he sounded like that. Partially because she couldn't bear to see the accompanying hopeful look in his eyes, but also because she knew that, if she looked at him, she was likely to end up saying something that she definitely shouldn't be saying.

'It just seems like — you aren't always entirely _there_ with the contestants,' she said, still talking to her shoes. 'Like your mind is elsewhere.'

James was quiet for a long minute, and Lily looked up to check that he'd heard what she'd said, that he hadn't slipped quietly out of the room while she hadn't been looking.

He was looking at her when she looked up, and her eyes immediately found his.

It was a mistake.

Because the hope that she'd heard in his voice a few minutes before was now written plainly all over his face. His eyes were wide, molten behind his glasses, and his lips were parted, and it was so obvious to her now, in the slight lift of his eyebrows and the intensity of his expression, that she wasn't alone in feeling the way that she did.

Lily swallowed hard against the tightening in her stomach.

'You're right,' James said, and though he pushed up off the dressing table then, he didn't move any closer to Lily, still standing across the room. 'You're right. My mind is elsewhere.'

Lily's mind was working furiously, trying to come up with something, _anything_ to say, but she could only focus on her heart thudding hard against her ribs and the way that James was looking at her, looking at her like he knew everything, and she couldn't think of anything to say, couldn't think of anything at all.

James didn't seem to mind. He just pulled his eyes from hers and trailed them slowly over her. Her body warmed as he traced his eyes over her, and though James knew she was watching him, he didn't try to hide the fact that he was running his gaze over every visible piece of her.

When his eyes found hers again, Lily could feel the heat in them from across the room.

'I think your mind is elsewhere, too,' he said.

Lily was certain that he knew it was.

James took one careful step forward, and Lily couldn't help herself. It was like there was an invisible cord pulling at them and once one of them released the tension, they had no choice but to come together.

Lily pushed off the door and stepped closer.

'We need to talk about your contract,' Lily said. It wasn't an acknowledgement of what he'd said a moment earlier, but it wasn't a denial either. And anyway, it should have been abundantly clear from the look on her face that what he'd said was absolutely true.

'What about my contract?'

'I — James, nothing can happen here. Your contract expressly forbids any relationship outside the show.'

He quirked an eyebrow and the left corner of his mouth hitched up just slightly. 'This isn't technically outside the show.'

' _James_.'

They'd moved across the room towards one another without Lily even realising it was happening. Now they were standing mere feet from one another and any desire Lily had to continue to remind James of his duty was starting to fall by the wayside.

James stepped forward and then he was within arm's reach of her.

'What do we do?'

She frowned. 'What do you mean, what do we do?'

'About this. About us. What do we do about this, because I don't know how I'm supposed to carry on like this doesn't exist between us?'

James' eyes darkened as he looked at her and Lily could feel her hands trembling slightly with the need to touch him.

She kept her hands resolutely by her sides, even when James slid forward another inch, ducking his head a bit so he could maintain eye contact.

'I —' She racked her brain, tried to think of something, _anything,_ but she knew that the only way out of this contract was to break it, and she was not about to encourage James to take that path. It would mean months, at least, of litigation for him, she'd lose her job… they'd both lose face, too, and the effect that that would have on every other part of their lives...

She shook her head slowly and tried not to watch as the disappointment spread across James' face.

'I don't think there's anything we can do, James.'

He nodded slowly. 'I still want to read it. The contract. See if I can't find something.'

Lily huffed. 'What do you expect to find that I haven't? I've read the entire thing a dozen times over.'

James raised an eyebrow and smirked at her. 'Looking for loopholes, Evans?'

He should not be allowed to look at her like that. That smirk, the dangerously intoxicating glimmer in his eyes —

The look in James' eyes could've burnt whole cities to the ground.

She swallowed. Cleared her throat.

'It's pretty airtight.'

James inched closer and Lily sucked in a breath. His smile widened a touch before his expression became serious again.

'That's a shame.'

Lily nodded jerkily. 'A right shame.'

Lily wanted to step closer, close the remaining distance and feel his skin under her hands. She wasn't sure what he would do once they got started, how he would respond, how he would touch her. The plethora of options made it so that every single part of her body tingled with anticipated contact, made it so that every single bit of her was on edge.

Everything was so close, just one tiny movement away.

James lifted his arm slowly then, giving her enough time to notice what he was doing. He watched her gaze flick to his hand as he cut across the space between them, and when she brought her eyes back to his, she saw the question in them, and she gave a small nod in response.

She was going to regret this, but _god,_ she needed something.

Lily closed her eyes as James reached out to cup her face. She leaned into his hand, warm and a bit rough, and though she wanted, more than anything, to see the look on his face just then, she knew that any remaining resolve she had would completely evaporate the moment she looked him in the eye.

James stepped forward again and Lily could feel the heat radiating off his body and it would be so easy, so easy to step into him, to thread her fingers through the hair at the base of his neck, to start something that she knew neither of them was going to stop.

It was right there.

And then Lily pulled in a deep, shuddering breath and took a step back.

James' hand fell from her cheek and Lily let herself open her eyes.

'James,' she was begging him, convincing him, because she needed him to convince her, 'we can't. You _know_ we can't.'

James dipped his head and pulled in a long, slow breath. It took him a moment, but when he looked back up at Lily, his expression was calmer. Maybe a bit resigned.

'Yeah, alright.'

She could see all his objections plainly on his face — she knew, in spite of his "alright" that James wanted nothing more than to push on this. All the objections were right there, and though she could tell that James was as frustrated as she was, she was glad that he was seeing sense, that he understood how limited their options were.

She needed someone to check her impulses because there was no way that her logical side was going to continue to win out. If James was equally aware of their situation and had even the slightest bit more control over himself, they might just have a fighting chance at getting through this show without getting sued.

Lily took another deep breath and it was the reminder she needed to take another step back. And once she'd stepped back, she found she couldn't stop, and then she was turning on her heel and striding quickly out of the room, leaving James quietly stunned in her wake.


	23. Chapter 22

**I can't remember who I promised two chapters to, but here we are**

 **enjoy x**

* * *

Lily didn't sleep at all that night.

She knew that she was going to regret it and she'd _tried_ to drug herself to sleep, but her body was too keyed up. She just laid in bed, on top of her duvet, and stared at the ceiling while she waited for the sun to come up.

James had feelings for her.

James had feelings for her and they seemed as strong as her feelings for him.

They had feelings for one another and there was literally nothing that she could do about it.

When the sun came up around five that morning, Lily grabbed her mobile off the bedside table in a fit of what was probably madness and started scrolling through her contacts.

Maybe she just needed to get laid. Maybe she was feeling… the way she was… about James because she hadn't had sex in a fucking geological age, and he was attractive and kind and — maybe she just needed to get laid.

Maybe it was exhaustion-fuelled idiocy, but it seemed like something she needed to at least consider before she let herself continue to freak out about the situation she was in.

She scrolled through her contacts for the better part of an hour in an attempt to convince herself that everything twisting around inside her about James was really just her unused and repressed sex drive, but even Sam, her old standby, didn't appeal to her anymore.

Lily sighed, dropped her mobile beside her, and sat up.

It was a lot more complicated when the feelings were more than just "I really, really need to get laid" feelings.

Lily showered, dressed, and grabbed a breakfast bar and a cup of tea from the kitchen before she headed out into the garden to check on the prep for the date that night. They'd needed to convert the whole garden from the highland games setup from the day before into a soft, romantic evening date scene, and while she had complete faith in the crew, she still needed to check and make sure everything was on schedule.

She was sure it was, but she just needed to make sure.

She also just really needed to get out of the house.

James had walked into the kitchen just as she finished preparing her tea and she'd waved awkwardly at him and said some combination of "sleep well?" and "nice weather, eh?", and she was absolutely going to dissolve if she'd stayed in there to hear his reply.

There was no way that she was going to get through the rest of this show without getting caught if that was how she was going to behave.

She spent the morning floating between the yard and the house and doing what she could to avoid being alone with James.

He didn't make it easy on her, though. He sat at the kitchen table for the better part of two hours before he finally gave up and wandered off.

She knew that it was juvenile — _incredibly_ juvenile — to be avoiding him, but she also wasn't sure that she knew a better way to handle this. Because what if their little chat the night before had opened some kind of door? What if, in getting it out in the open, they made it so that they wouldn't be able to control themselves when they were together? How clearly would it be written on their faces? How fucking obvious would it be? How long until someone found out and how long until they told Peter and how long until James was sued and Lily was fired and their lives were completely ruined?

The longer she was left alone with it, the more she spiralled out of control about it.

She finally came inside for good late in the afternoon — the dinner set was done, the garden was lit and landscaped, and there was really no reason for her to continue to wander around outside. Especially since Benjy had long since given up talking to her again after he'd cornered her behind a hedge to ask "where she and lover boy had got off too yesterday" and Lily had snapped at him because she'd nearly had a panic attack trying to come up with a convincing excuse.

She was standing at the counter brewing herself another cup of tea, munching away on a gingernut, when James walked back into the kitchen.

Well, he'd actually come in right as Lily was brushing a ton of goddamn crumbs off her chest.

Lily paused mid-swipe and gave him an awkward smile as she lowered her arm. 'Hi.'

James grinned at her as he walked over to the counter and grabbed a mug from the cabinet behind her head. She could just feel the heat of his body as he leaned over her and she prayed to god that she wouldn't just press her hips into his and put herself out of her misery.

'Hey, Evans. Where've you been today? It seems like you've been avoiding me.'

Lily shook her head and watched as more crumbs cascaded down onto her shirt. God, she was sexy.

'No,' she covered her mouth with her hand so he wouldn't have to watch her chewing. 'Not avoiding. Just busy.'

'You looked busy,' James said, a smirk tugging at his lips as he poured water into his mug. 'Standing around the garden and all that.'

Lily watched him bustle about with his tea, watched the way the fabric of his t-shirt moved over his shoulders.

He tapped his spoon against the side of his mug — effectively bringing her to — and set it onto the plate on the counter before he leaned up against the cabinets and took a long sip of tea.

Lily cleared her throat. 'I was — supervising. The dinner set up.'

James hummed and nodded knowingly as he lowered his mug. 'Ah, yes. How silly of me.'

'Very silly,' Lily agreed.

She hadn't meant for it to happen, but she suddenly sounded very breathless.

James held her gaze for a moment before he groaned softly and changed the subject. 'My arms are so sore.'

He rolled his shoulders and Lily watched for a moment before she looked back up at him.

'It's a good thing I don't have to actually eat on this dinner,' he said, his eyes shining with amusement because he'd _definitely_ caught her staring, 'because I don't think I can even lift a fork to my mouth.'

Lily snorted, glad of the opportunity to tease him because it meant dipping back into territory that she was familiar with. 'I saw you eating breakfast this morning. You managed perfectly fine.'

James frowned. 'You know, Evans, I'm going to need you to be nicer to me.'

Lily rolled her eyes. 'I'm plenty nice to you. What more do you want?'

James ran his tongue along his bottom lip and his eyes darkened as he dragged them over her again.

'I can think of a few things.'

And suddenly she was back in his room and he was looking at her like that and they were all alone and all she could think about was stepping forward and running her tongue down his neck.

She needed to salvage this.

They'd been so civil to one another so far — outside her head, anyway — and she wasn't going to let him lead them down a path they really shouldn't go down.

She could salvage this.

Lily cleared her throat. 'Anyway. Lena will be here about half nine, once it's passably dark enough outside to look like a proper evening date.'

James frowned before he nodded slowly and took another long sip of tea. When he lowered his mug, his expression had cleared.

'Okay. What time do I need to be ready?'

James was dressed and made up by eight — he might've been done by half seven, though, if James and Alice had stopped talking about _TOWIE_ long enough to actually get his face on.

'Can you believe all the drama Amber T has started already?' James smirked at Lily in the mirror and she tried her best to glare at him. He knew that she wanted to have enough time to film the diary before Lena got there and he _knew_ that she couldn't stand _TOWIE_ and he was absolutely dragging his feet on purpose.

'No, oh my god!' Alice tapped her brush on the side of the compact she was using and started blending powder down James' neck. 'When she tried to tell Jamie that nothing had happened —'

'— oh my god, and Dan had already talked to him!'

' _RIGHT_?! And then when Jamie comes back to talk to her, thinking he's going to get closure.'

'And then Dan going around and telling everyone he was single two episodes later! Like what was —'

'Okay,' Lily cleared her throat. 'This is all great, but we need to film James' diary before Lena gets here, so if we could?' She turned her finger in a circle in the air like _wrap it up_.

James shook his head at Lily in the mirror before he turned to look back up at Alice. 'She's so uncultured, this one.'

Lily shot James a look and he winked at her.

Despite the distractions, Lily managed to get James through his pre-date diary and have him in front of the house waiting for Lena's car a few minutes before she was set to arrive. He kept turning around and shooting her looks, looks like he wanted to talk to her about something, but she was glad of the fact that he was mic'd up and Benjy had a camera on him — it meant that she could get out of talking about whatever it was he wanted to talk about without having to actually turn him down.

She still wasn't ready to talk about what had happened in his room yesterday.

Maybe tomorrow.

Or never. Never honestly sounded ideal.

Lena's car pulled up a few minutes later, the tyres crunching over the gravel drive. James had been staring down at his shoes, and Lily watched as he adjusted his stance so he stood up a bit straighter. He stepped forward as soon as the car came to a stop, reached in to help Lena out of the car.

James smiled at her as he shut the car door behind her. 'You look beautiful.'

She did. Her black hair curled around her shoulders and her gold dress shone against her dark skin in the soft light of the courtyard.

Lena bit her lip to hide a smile. 'Thanks, James. You clean up pretty well yourself.'

Lena's shoes, royal blue heels that had to be at least four inches tall, slid a bit on the gravel when she'd stepped out of the car, and James put a hand on her elbow as they walked down the path the crew had laid earlier that day towards the dinner table at the back. There was a small stage with a band, a table surrounded by candles, and a large wooden dance floor where, just the day before, giant jugs of water and kettle bells had been. The band started playing, some soft, jazzy number, as James and Lena approached, and James helped Lena into her chair before sitting down opposite her.

Lily wasn't sure what it was, but watching James with Lena was nothing like watching him with Liza had been the week before.

He and Lena laughed, but Lily could tell that it was slightly hollow on James' part. He smiled and asked questions and got Lena talking, but Lily didn't miss the way that his eyes would flick to hers every once in a while, didn't miss the signs that James' attention had wandered.

Because they weren't actually eating the dinner in front of them, it was impossible to soak up the silence that fell between them whenever James or Lena finished a story. They'd both sit there, awkwardly shifting their weight in their seats, before they thought of another question to ask that could buy them at least a few more minutes of conversation.

It was painful. Incredibly painful.

Even Jax had long since given up trying to spark some kind of chemistry between the two of them — he'd shouted and pestered and made them reshoot scene after scene, but the chemistry never got any better and so he seemed intent on just letting them both look as awkward as they were in the final cut.

After about an hour and a half of stunted conversation at the table, Lena stood and held out her hand to James.

'Want to take a walk? Or we could dance if you want.'

James took her hand and stood. 'A walk sounds lovely.'

Lily heard Benjy swear under his breath as he adjusted his steadicam straps and got to his feet to follow them.

Lily bit back a laugh and followed along behind him.

'So, it was nice getting to spend more time with you,' Lena said, smiling up at James as they started down the path towards the side of the house.

'It was nice spending more time with you, too.' James said.

They walked along in silence for a few feet before they both cleared their throats and attempted to speak at once.

'James —'

'So, Lena —'

Lena laughed and pointed at James. 'You go first.'

'No, no, you can go.'

Lena shook her head. 'No that's alright. I went first last time.'

'Oh, alright then.' James cleared his throat. 'So you know this is an elimination date, right?'

Lena nodded.

'Well,' James ran a hand through his hair. 'I — you're great, Lena, but — I don't think it's quite right. Between us.' He gestured between them with his finger.

Lena pressed her hand to her heart. 'Oh, thank god.'

James' eyes widened behind his glasses and Lily's jaw dropped.

'What?'

'Oh, James, I'm sorry,' Lena put her hand in James' forearm. 'I don't mean — you're lovely, obviously. But you're right. We're just not right for one another. I was going to break up with you, actually, so —'

Jax sighed angrily and held up his hands. 'Cut!'

Lena spun around and James looked at Jax over Lena's shoulder. Lena dropped her hands onto her hips and glared at Jax. 'What?'

God damn, it would've been nice to keep her around. They could do with more people like her on the show.

'You need to at least _look_ sad, Lena,' Jax said. 'Pretend like you're a little disappointed that he's breaking up with you.'

Lena raised an eyebrow at him. 'We're breaking up with each other.' She pointed between her and James, and James bit his lip to keep from laughing.

'Regardless,' Jax walked back behind the camera, 'make an effort. Go back round the corner, start again.'

Lena shot James an exasperated look, and he took her elbow, led her back around the side of the house. James stopped walking as they rounded the corner, and Lena paused, looking up at him before turning to face him.

'Something wrong?'

James breathed a heavy sigh and Lena's forehead creased.

God, they were really going for it. They could win a BAFTA.

'So, I'm sure you know that this is an elimination date,' James began, and Lena nodded, a slightly more worried look on her face.

'And you're a wonderful woman, Lena, really, but —' James hesitated for a moment and Lena's frown deepened.

'I just don't think that there's real chemistry here, and so, I'm sorry, but I can't ask you to stay.'

Lena dropped her gaze and nodded slowly as James' words sunk in.

'No, you're right,' she looked up at him and gave him a brave smile. 'You're right. It was wonderful to meet you, though, James. I hope you find someone here that makes you happy.'

James nodded and then his eyes drifted up over Lena's head and found Lily's. He held her gaze for a moment, not long enough for anyone to really notice, and when he looked back down at Lena, there was the tiniest bit of warmth there.

'I hope so, too.'


	24. Chapter 23

**One day I'll be able to update without having to combine chapters I stg (for those that need a count, we're now at 49 total chapters)**

 **Also, you can thank the tumblr anon who complimented me this morning and made me feel like dropping a chapter.**

* * *

The news of Lena's departure the night before had the contestants completely on edge moving into the ceremony the next night. Lena had seemed like a solid middle of the pack contender — she was kind, funny, gorgeous — and now she'd packed up her bags and disappeared in the middle of the night, and everyone who had _thought_ they were safe suddenly found themselves questioning their standing.

It might've helped if anyone had bothered to tell the contestants the the breakup was incredibly mutual, but Peter had urged everyone on set for the date that night stay completely silent on the terms of Lena's absence.

The poor producers on the contestant side didn't have a moment of rest the entire day.

Lily, on the other hand, was able to spend a fairly easy day with James — they pulled together the final list of contestants he wanted to bring forward into next week, finalised a few details about meeting his family the next day, and Lily even convinced him to pack up most of his things so that they didn't have to wait for him to find everything in his room the next morning when they were _supposed_ to be leaving.

So what if she also spent most of her time thinking about grabbing James by the arms and pushing him back onto the kitchen table? She didn't actually _act_ on it and that was what mattered.

Even if James could definitely read it in her eyes whenever she was thinking about it.

It didn't matter as long as she didn't actually do anything.

She was going to need to get herself together, though, because they were going to be in front of Marlene later that afternoon. Marlene would see it on Lily's face immediately and she wouldn't hesitate to kick Lily's arse, especially since she'd brought up Lily's _feelings_ just a few days ago.

And anyway, she and James still hadn't actually _talked_ about the conversation they'd had in his room the other day.

Lily couldn't decide whether or not that was a good thing, but it hadn't seemed to affect their working relationship, these newly disclosed feelings of theirs. It would probably just be best to let it lie and act like everything was normal.

Still, though she knew it would be the right thing to do, it was hard to inject distance between them, her and James. It was hard, knowing that he was watching her, not to catch his eye when she tucked her hair behind her ear. It was hard not to stand up a little straighter, to smile a little bit wider — it was harder still to keep from dropping innocent touches whenever she could. A hand on the elbow when she stepped around him at the kitchen counter while they made lunch, her toe nudging his as they sat at the table writing up his list.

She was letting their mutual feelings go to her head, and she knew it was stupid and she knew it was reckless, but she was going to reel it in.

Because it wasn't supposed to get dark until well after ten that night, Peter and Marlene decided that they could start filming around eight, once the light started to dim, so that they had enough time to finish filming before daybreak.

That meant, though, that the crew needed to light the entire set for dusk and _then_ they'd need to re-light once it got properly dark outside.

'We're going to have to deal with this in Iceland in a few weeks anyway,' Marlene had said, steadfastly ignoring the grumbling going on all around her. 'We might as well develop a system.'

It wasn't technically her job to be delivering bad news, but Peter always made her do it because he "wanted everyone to like him".

It seemed like wasted effort on his part, honestly, but Lily wasn't going to bother telling him that.

With the new filming schedule, Lily rushed James through hair and makeup and then spent five minutes bouncing nervously on her toes outside his bedroom while James changed into his suit. She kept checking her watch and shouting the time through the door — the first few times, James responded, told her how much more he had to go before he was ready, but then she did it so often that he just stopped replying altogether.

The only thing that stopped her going in there and physically tugging him into the suit herself was the fact that she didn't think she'd survive it.

Or actually end up putting anything _on_ him.

So she just paced restlessly outside his door and begged him to hurry up because she really, _really_ wanted to sleep tonight and they were going to be _late_.

When James opened the door a few minutes later, though, all thought of her deadline went completely out the window.

God, he was gorgeous.

He was in another classic black suit, and though she'd seen a million men in suits exactly like these, there was something about the way that James bloody Potter filled out a suit. The jacket fitted seamlessly over his broad shoulders, tapered at the waist, and the crisp white of his shirt against his warm brown skin — she was going to have a heart attack.

She pulled in a sharp breath, turned on her heel, and started walking swiftly down the corridor.

'Double time, James, we've got a show to film.'

She could hear the chatter of the contestants from upstairs, but she found herself listening to the steady beat of James' steps behind her more than anything else. He was walking close behind her and she could feel his gaze on her back and it would be so easy to just turn around and push him back into his room and —

She turned and started down the stairs.

They were filming tonight's ceremony in the large lounge area at the back of the house — there was plenty of space for everyone to fit, a door out to the back garden in case anyone wanted to get some air, and it had this rough, almost rustic look that had really appealed to Peter when they were scouting it.

She was loathe to admit it, but Peter had been right about the aesthetic.

They walked through the house without speaking, Lily leading the way and James following close behind. When they got within sight of the line of cameras in the lounge, Lily turned around to face him and James stopped short.

He raised an eyebrow at her. 'What?'

'You ready?'

James nodded. 'Yeah. Why?'

'I don't — just checking.' She ran her eyes over him again, and a slow smirk started on James' lips. She ignored him.

This wasn't about that.

Lily clicked her tongue at him. 'Come here.'

James grinned at her then. 'What? Can't bear to have me leave you here alone?'

She smacked his arm and shook her head at him. 'Shut up. And no, you prat, your tie is just crooked.'

Lily stepped closer, reached up, and, with slightly trembling fingers, straightened James' tie.

James' eyes flicked down to hers as she adjusted the knot, and though Lily could feel him looking at her, she kept her eyes trained on her hands. At least for the moment.

She waited until she was absolutely sure that the tie was straight before looking back up at him. It was a mistake, especially in a room that was currently full of every bloody person on the show, but —

His eyes had gone dark again, and standing this close to him, she could see the faint shadow of scruff on his jaw, and he smelled so _fucking_ good that she wanted to step closer, until she was pressed against him, and just —

She left her hands on his chest a bit longer than was strictly necessary, and if she ran her fingers lightly down the fabric of his shirt, well —

'Oi, Potter, let's get a move on, eh?'

Fuck. Act natural.

Lily turned around to frown at Jax, steadfastly ignored Marlene, who, Lily could see, was staring at her and James from the centre of the room ahead of them.

Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck.

'Just making sure he's camera ready, Jax, relax.' She hoped no one noticed the way she subtly slid back from James or the too-casual tone in her voice.

Jax rolled his eyes. 'He's bloody gorgeous, Lil, now come on, Potter!'

Lily turned back to look James over once more, just to make sure, to really make sure, that he was camera ready, only to find that he was already looking at her. He held her gaze as he side stepped her, only pulling his eyes from hers when he stepped forward and started towards the crowd of contestants in the centre of the room.

* * *

Because they were, finally, not flying internationally, Lily got to have a proper lie in next morning.

Sure, she still woke up with the bloody sun, but she got to lay in bed for a few hours later than she normally would have done, and at this point, she was willing to count that as a victory.

James, too, seemed to appreciate the extra sleep, because he was in a spectacular mood when Lily went to check that he was awake early that afternoon.

'All packed?'

She was leaning up against his door frame, arms crossed, and James was sitting on the end of his bed tying his trainers.

He smiled at her as he stood. 'All packed. When's the flight?'

'We leave in half an hour,' Lily said. 'So if you want to come dig through whatever's leftover in the kitchen, you might want to do that sooner rather than later.'

'Fuck,' James grabbed his bag off the floor beside the bed and started across the room. 'Do you think all the trail mix is gone?'

'Probably. Zola threatened anyone who dared touch it, so I'm sure she took it before she cleared out this morning.'

'Fuck. Are you kidding?'

Lily gasped in mock horror, touched a hand to her chest. 'Why would I kid about trail mix?'

James huffed and marched past her, and Lily burst out laughing.

The trail mix was, indeed, gone, so when they touched down in London a few hours later, James made them stop at a some boutique greengrocers a few miles from his parents house because "he just couldn't carry on without more bloody trail mix".

They arrived at James' parents' place in Twickenham about half three, James still elbow deep in the giant container of trail mix he'd insisted on and Lily had only bought to avoid James making a scene in the poshest grocery store she'd ever been in in her life. His parents' house, a light grey modern two-story on a street of bricked Tudors, was on a small, tree-lined side street, maybe a half mile away from Twickenham Green. While the light grey of the house and the steel grey of the slate in the drive might have made the house blend in with the usually grey sky, it was saved from being overly depressing by the vibrant red door and the bright, colourful flowers set in planters all along the garden wall.

Lily leaned over the open her door when the car came to a stop along the side of the road and James shouted so loudly that Lily nearly had a heart attack.

'Oi! Don't!'

She pressed her hand to her heart. 'What the fuck, James?!'

James smiled at her apologetically. 'I just — I didn't want you to open your door.'

Lily raised an eyebrow at him, ran her fingers over the door handle (and bit back a smile as she watched James squirm). 'This door?'

'Yes, Evans, please. Mum'll kill me if I don't open your door for you.'

Lily snorted. 'You haven't opened my door once the entire time I've known you.'

'I know, but — you're always jumping out.'

He looked a little pained, but Lily had to tease him a bit. 'Or you're half asleep and never notice when we get anywhere!'

'Evans, _please_.'

Lily hummed thoughtfully. 'I don't know. I don't want your mum to get the wrong impression about how you've been conducting yourself.'

' _Evans_.' He dropped his hands pleadingly onto her knee and he looked so pathetic that she didn't know how she could possibly deny him.

'Alright, go on. But hurry up, I'm not waiting for you forever. And don't you dare start making this a regular thing.'

James nearly fell out the car in his haste to get out.

Lily didn't have much reason to be at James' house that afternoon, outside of dropping him off and going over the filming schedule with his parents one final time. She knew that she wasn't likely to be there that long, that her interaction with James' parents was going to be little more than a verbal version of the emails she and Mary had sent them a few weeks ago, but she was still almost unbearably nervous as she climbed out onto the pavement outside James' house and followed him up the slate drive towards the front door.

It might have had something to do with the fact that it was just the two of them — her and James — alone. They'd wanted to give James a bit of space with his parents, give them some time to relax and reconnect, so Benjy was coming over early tomorrow morning to film some "James has just arrived home and aren't we all so excited to see him" scenes before they went off to film the group date at Twickenham Green. Being alone with James, with all the things they still hadn't really talked about hanging in the air between them… some sad, twisted up little part of her felt like she was going to his house for the first time and meeting his parents in a way that was way, _way_ more significant than it actually was.

James knocked when they reached the front door and stepped back so that he was standing beside her. He looked down at her as he settled in, and there was something in his eyes that made her think that maybe, _maybe_ James was thinking about this moment in the same twisted up way that she was.

Then the door opened and their eyes snapped apart.

Mrs Potter was shorter than Lily had ever thought that she would be, especially based on the way that James talked about her. She was easily a foot shorter than James, probably a bit more, and a fair few inches shorter than Lily. She was wearing a light, flowy pair of trousers, a cornflower blue top, and a bright pink hijab, and Lily had a really difficult time imagining that this bright, sunny woman would ever kick anyone's arse for neglecting to open a car door or wearing the wrong colour kilt.

Mrs Potter beamed at James the moment she opened the door and stepped forward to wrap her arms around him. 'James!'

James chuckled as he squeezed her back. 'Hi, Mum.'

Mrs Potter turned and smiled at Lily as she released James, took one of Lily's hand into both of her own. 'And you must be Lily. We've corresponded.'

Lily nodded. 'It's lovely to meet you, Mrs Potter.'

She waved her off. 'Please. Call me Euphemia.'

Lily smiled. 'Lovely to meet you, Euphemia.'

Euphemia beamed at them before she turned around and started towards the interior of the house. James followed, and so Lily, because she wasn't sure what else to do, followed suit.

'I must say, James, I'm glad to see that you're still alive. I haven't heard from you in weeks.'

James sighed heavily. 'You know they took my mobile, Mum.'

'Oh, that's right.' Euphemia waved her hand as she led them into a large, open kitchen at the back of the house and gestured that James and Lily should sit down at the table in the corner. 'Well, you think you still could've been in touch once and awhile.'

James frowned. 'I hope you haven't spent too much time worrying.'

Euphemia waved him off again as she pulled the lid off a giant pot she had simmering on the cooktop. 'Please, dear, your father and I have been busy.'

James shot Lily an exasperated look, but she was too busy thinking about whatever delicious-smelling thing Euphemia was cooking to properly sympathise.

'He's been in good hands, Euphemia,' she said, 'I promise you.'

Euphemia wiped her hands on a tea towel she had hanging on the oven door as she turned around and smiled at Lily. 'I don't doubt it.'

Lily felt her cheeks heat, and she looked down at her lap to hide her blush.

'So, how've you been, James? Have you been enjoying yourself so far? Meet anyone you think we'll like?'

Lily picked her head up at Euphemia's question, and James' eyes flickered to her for a moment before he looked back at his mother. Lily hoped that Euphemia wouldn't have noticed, but there was something about the set of her expression that told Lily she wasn't one to miss anything.

'Yeah,' James leaned back in his seat and crossed his arms. 'A lot of the women are really nice.'

Euphemia grabbed the electric kettle off the base in the corner and crossed to the sink to fill it. 'Can I get you both some tea?'

James, for some reason, sighed, but nodded, and Euphemia turned to Lily.

She smiled. 'Alright. Thank you.'

Euphemia set the kettle on the base and took three mugs out of the cupboard, set them onto the counter before she crossed the kitchen and opened a door that turned out to be the pantry door.

'What biscuits do you like, Lily?'

'Oh, I — you don't need to get biscuits out.'

'Nonsense. You've been travelling all day, you must be famished.'

'Really —'

'Gingernuts, Mum,' James said, cutting across Lily's reply. 'She likes gingernuts.'

Lily heard the packet crumpling from inside the pantry as Euphemia grabbed it off the shelf.

'Thank you, James.' Euphemia smiled at him as she walked back into the kitchen and shut the pantry door behind her.

Euphemia set the biscuits on the table and walked back over to where the kettle was sitting. She dropped teabags into each of their mugs and poured water over them when the kettle clicked off a moment later.

James hopped up from his seat to help carry the tea things over to the table as his mum set the kettle back onto the base. Euphemia patted his arm gratefully and she went over to the fridge to fetch a litre of milk.

James smiled at Lily as he set her mug in front of her and it was almost enough to stop her heart. He really needed to stop looking at her like that.

'So, James,' Euphemia sat down in the seat next to Lily, diagonal from James' spot opposite them. 'Are you ready to give me a real answer to my question?'

James raised an eyebrow at her. 'What question?'

Euphemia sighed and shot Lily a look, and there was something so _James_ about it that Lily nearly had a stroke.

'About the women you're dating, dear. You trotted out some PR-approved line, and we both know that's not what I'm after.'

James sighed, reached over and grabbed the sugar bowl from the centre of the table and spooned sugar into his tea. 'I don't know them well enough, really.'

'James Fleamont Potter —'

James groaned and Lily snorted. She tried to cover it up with a soft, fake cough, but James shot her a glare anyway.

'I've only known these women for like two weeks, Mum. What do you want me to say?'

'I want to know where your head's at.' Euphemia grabbed the litre of milk from the centre of the table and sloshed a bit into her mug. 'Or your heart. Whichever.'

'I —' James looked up at Lily again, and she wished he wouldn't because she knew that Euphemia was watching him.

'Liza,' he said. 'Liza is pretty great. And Summer.'

Lily could see Euphemia looking at her now out of the corner of her eye, but Lily refused to pick her head up. She dumped a measure of milk into her tea and took a long, slow sip, choosing to ignore the fact that she was burning that absolute shit out of her mouth.

'Tell me about Liza and Summer, then,' Euphemia said. She leaned back in her seat and surveyed James, and that, too, was something that James had clearly learned from her. Their expressions were so similar, Lily wouldn't have been surprised if they told her that they'd spent years practising them together.

'Summer is American,' James said. He swirled his mug gently in his hands and looked down at the table as he spoke. 'She's a dolphin trainer from Florida and she's really sweet and… I don't know, bouncy? Liza is a geography teacher from Leeds. She coaches her school's football team. She's lovely.'

Euphemia nodded slowly and took a thoughtful sip of her tea. 'Interesting.'

James' head snapped up. 'What's interesting?'

Euphemia shook her head. 'Nothing. They sound lovely, James. I can't wait to meet them.'

'Well, Mum, actually, I — I don't think I'm going to bring anyone by while we're here.'

 _What._

Euphemia frowned at him. 'You're not?'

James shook his head, looked back down at the mug of tea in his hands. 'No. I mean, I get to decide who visits and I — I don't know that I'm _there_ with anyone? Yet? I — Sirius will meet them tomorrow at the thing. Some of them. So I'll get to hear his opinion, I guess, but I just —'

Spluttering. Fool.

She was going to kill him. Lily was going to fucking kill him.

Euphemia raised an eyebrow at him. 'You don't seem to have a problem with Lily meeting us.'

Lily's heart rocketed into her throat.

'Lily's — she's a producer — it's different.'

There was the tiniest hint of a smirk on Euphemia's lips when she replied. 'Is it?'

Fuck, fuck, _fuck_.

James, unhelpfully, just gaped at Euphemia, though Lily supposed it was better than having him continue to splutter through answers that only seemed to give Euphemia more to work with. Lily set her mug down on the table and cleared her throat.

'While we're talking about it, actually, I wanted to see if I could go over the filming schedule for the next few days? Just to make sure we're all on the same page?'

Euphemia continued to stare at James for a long moment before she turned to Lily. She smiled, a warm smile that was just a little _too_ knowing, and nodded.

'Of course, dear. Let's hear it.'

There wasn't really that much to go over, especially since James was now, _apparently,_ not bringing anyone to meet his parents while they were in town this week, but she hoped that even a slight change in subject would be enough to distract Euphemia from James' complete and total inability to hide his feelings.

'One of our cameramen, Benjy Fenwick, will be over around eight tomorrow morning to film some shots of James like he's just getting home, and then we'll be over Saturday afternoon to get some family conversation footage. So if everyone could be here that afternoon, around noon, that would be great.'

Euphemia nodded. 'What's the conversation footage for?'

Lily cleared her throat. 'Just a chance to get James talking about some of the women on the show — he'll bounce ideas and feelings off you, that sort of thing. The crew should be over Saturday morning, around eight, to start lighting the space. It'll take a few hours, but we'll do our best to stay out of your way as much as possible.'

Euphemia waved her hand dismissively. 'Don't worry about that. We knew what we signed up for when we signed the agreements, Lily. A little inconvenience won't be the end of the world.' She smiled.

Lily nodded. 'Just let me know if we're all getting to be a bit much. It can be overwhelming.'

'I'm sure. Have you been feeling overwhelmed, James?'

James looked up from his mug, his eyes meeting Lily's briefly before they met Euphemia's. He nodded before he lifted his cup to his lips and finished off the rest of his tea.

'It's been pretty overwhelming, yeah,' he cleared his throat. 'Lily's been great in helping keep me grounded though, and the travelling has been nice.'

It was like he couldn't fucking help himself.

Luckily, Euphemia decided to let James' comment about her lie. 'What's the best thing you've seen on your travels so far?'

They chatted for the next hour or so about James' various exploits across Europe. James had gotten up and made them another round of tea, and they sat, drinking, laughing, and swapping stories about various things that had happened on the show.

It was just about six when Lily picked up her mug from the kitchen table and stood.

'I should get going.'

Euphemia frowned up at her. 'You're not staying for dinner?'

'I — I wouldn't want to impose.'

'Nonsense. You could never impose. And anyway, I cooked up plenty of food. All the boys are going to be here tonight, so I've got enough to feed the navy.'

James perked up instantly. 'Remus and Sirius are coming?'

Euphemia nodded. 'And your father should be home from work any minute. I know he'll want to meet you, too, Lily.' Euphemia smiled significantly at Lily, and Lily willed her cheeks not to go red.

'Are you really sure you don't mind having me stay?'

Euphemia smiled warmly at Lily as she stood. 'Of course I don't. We're happy to have you.'

She crossed back over to the kitchen to check on the dinner she still had simmering on the cooktop. James stood, grabbed the mugs from the table, shifted them in his arms so that he could take Lily's mug from her hands. Lily shook her head at him.

'I can wash my own mug, James.'

'Evans —'

Lily just raised a stern eyebrow at him and he sighed, 'Fine,' before following her over to the sink.

Lily was halfway through washing her mug when she heard the front door open.

'Mia! Is James here yet?'

Lily could hear the smile in Euphemia's voice without even having to turn around. 'He's in the kitchen with us, love.'

'Who's us?' Mr Potter's voice was getting louder as he walked through the house. 'The boys can't be here yet, it's too damn quiet in here.'

Mr Potter rounded the corner into the kitchen just as Lily set her mug on the draining board and damn near stopped in his tracks.

His eyes flicked from Lily to Euphemia (Lily noted she was biting back a smile) to James, before he stepped forward and pulled James into a hug.

'My boy.' Mr Potter clapped James on the back before he pulled back and looked at him. 'How are you, son?'

Mr Potter was just an inch or two shorter than his son, though it was difficult to tell because they both had the same wild hair, though Mr Potter's hair was salt and pepper to James' jet black. They both wore glasses, and though James more closely resembled his mother, there were a few things about him — the sharp jaw, the curve of his lips — that he'd clearly inherited from his father.

'I'm great, Dad.' James turned to the side and held his hand out in Lily's direction.

'Dad, this is Lily Evans, she —'

'One of the women from the show!' Mr Potter stepped around James and held his hand out to Lily to shake. 'It's lovely to meet you, Lily. I hope my son's been treating you right?'

'Oh, uh,' Lily cleared her throat awkwardly as she shook his hand, 'Mr Potter, I —'

'Call me Fleamont, dear, please! We could be family one day!'

'Fleamont,' Euphemia interrupted, 'she's a producer. She's not a contestant on the show.'

Fleamont's eyes widened. 'Oh, Lily, I'm so sorry!'

'No, it's —' she waved her hand, 'it's alright, honestly. We — it's fine.'

Euphemia walked over and wrapped an arm around Fleamont's waist before pressing herself up onto her toes and kissing his cheek. 'Now you see where my son's habit of putting his foot in his mouth comes from.'

'Mum,' James crossed his arms at her, 'I do not put my foot in my mouth!'

Euphemia just shot him a look and James sighed in defeat and uncrossed his arms.

Things, thankfully, didn't have time to get awkward, because the front door opened again and a man's voice shouted, 'Mum, we're here!'

James whipped around, a wide smile on his face, and darted out into the hallway. A moment later, the same voice shouted, 'James!' and Lily heard what sounded like one hug followed by another.

A few moments later, James rounded the corner wearing the widest smile Lily had seen on his face in a long time.

'Evans, this,' he pointed at the short man next to him with the long, wavy black hair, 'is my brother Sirius, and this,' he pointed at the tall, lanky blonde on the far left, 'is his fiance and my best friend, Remus.'

Sirius stepped forward and extended his hand towards Lily. 'Nice to meet you Producer Evans.'

Lily laughed. 'It's not a title, Sirius.'

Sirius grinned at her, and it was a bright, easy grin that was the kind that got people to do whatever you wanted them to. 'I know, but James here made a point to tell us a thousand times on the walk in that you were "his producer, his producer".' He lowered his voice to a frantic whisper in what was clearly an imitation of James.

James frowned at Sirius and gave him a look that had to be burning holes into the back of Sirius' head, but Sirius didn't seem to mind in the least. The blonde, Remus, thankfully stepped up to intervene while Sirius walked over to give Euphemia a hug.

'Ignore him,' Remus said, reaching out to shake Lily's hand when she extended it. 'It's lovely to meet you, Lily. I hope James hasn't been too annoying on set so far?'

Lily grinned and shook her head. 'He's been a perfect gentleman.'

Sirius snorted from the other side of the kitchen. 'Isn't that a damn shame?'

Euphemia swatted him with a tea towel.

Lily stayed at the Potters' house far, far longer than she really should have. They'd eaten dinner, a fish curry that had nearly made Lily _cry_ it was so good, and, despite her better judgment, she'd followed them into the lounge after dinner to sit around and chat and watch television.

She'd tried to leave, had tried to leave a _few_ times, but every time she'd gotten up or started to say that she had to leave, one of them (usually James or Sirius or Euphemia) came up with some reason that she had to stay.

She wasn't really that annoyed about it if she was honest, but still. She was supposed to be injecting distance between them, not sitting in the lounge with James and his family and beating Sirius in snap until he cried.

She finally managed to extract herself around half eight, despite the many, many pleas for her to stay.

'I can't believe you're going to leave us here with this,' Sirius pointed his thumb over his shoulder at James as they walked into the entryway and James scoffed.

Lily laughed. 'He's your brother isn't he?'

Sirius sighed. 'Doesn't mean he's not boring. You're fun.'

'I'm fun!' Lily could see James pouting out of the corner or her eye, but she and Sirius both ignored him.

'I'll see you tomorrow,' she said. 'We can have fun then.'

Sirius sighed again in a long suffering sort of way. 'Fine. But if I die of boredom overnight, it's your fault.'

Lily rolled her eyes. 'Good lord. Go away.'

Sirius shot her a grin. 'Fine. I'll leave you two _lovebirds_ alone. See you tomorrow, _Evans_.' He winked at her, and Lily pretended that _that_ was why Lily's cheeks had gone blood red.

'I'm sorry,' James said when they were alone again. 'He's an idiot.'

Lily shook her head. 'I love him. He's great.'

They stood there silently for a moment, awkwardly shifting their weight from side to side and avoiding looking at one another.

After a minute, James cleared his throat. 'Can we — can we go out front and talk for a second? Before you leave?'

Lily nodded. James opened the door and they stepped out into the cool evening air.

It was so quiet here — she could hear the cars on the A305 a short way away, but the houses and trees separating them muffled the sound until it was almost impossible to hear. The sun was still up, it wouldn't go down for another half hour or so at least, but the warm golden light of the late evening shone down and cast everything in a soft glow.

James stuffed both of his hands in his trouser pockets and rocked back and forth on his heels while he tried to decide what he wanted to say.

When he looked up at her, there was a resolve there that Lily couldn't really interpret.

'We still haven't talked about what happened back in Scotland.'

Lily's mouth went dry.

'What about it?'

'Well,' James shifted his weight from foot to foot, and Lily wanted to reach her hands out and physically hold him still. 'We — I mean, Lily, we —'

He pulled in a breath. 'We have feelings for one another. And I know that we can't — we said we wouldn't do anything about that while I'm on the show, but what if I'm not on the show?'

'James —'

'Hear me out. What's the worst they could do to me if I quit the show now? If I tell them that I — I don't know, now that I've been doing this, I don't think this is right for me or something like that. I don't have to say anything about us —'

Lily was already shaking her head. 'They'll sue you. I'll lose my _job._ '

'Why would you lose your job? I won't even mention you!'

'James — it'll come out. We can't keep something like that a secret forever.'

'Maybe we started something after the fact. Go public like a month after I leave the show. How could they connect that to the time we've spent during filming?'

Lily crossed her arms. 'James, Peter already isn't thrilled with you, quitting would just give him an excuse to do whatever terrible thing he's probably already thinking about.'

'What if I don't care?' James stepped closer to her then, and his face glowed in the light from the setting sun and Lily's heart started pounding in her chest because it was unbelievable, absolutely unbelievable, that he was this beautiful. That he was this beautiful and that he was looking at her like that.

'What if I don't care about what Pratigrew'll do?'

'James —'

'Evans,' he stepped forward and, when she didn't move away, he gently took her hands in his. His fingers were trembling slightly and it made Lily want to step into him and pull him into her arms.

'Evans, I don't care about anything else but you.'

She squeezed his hands tighter, she didn't even think about it, and stepped closer to him before she thought better of it.

Then the reality of what she was doing, of what she was encouraging, hit her.

She dropped his hands.

'James, we can't. You _know_ we can't.'

He didn't even try to hide the fact that he was frustrated. 'Well why not?'

Lily gave him an exasperated look. 'You know perfectly well why not. We've been over this —'

'I don't care if they sue me, Lily. It's worth it to me, it's worth it if it means we get to give this a shot!'

'You might not care if they sue you, James, but I can't lose my job!' She could hear herself going a bit hysterical, but she didn't care because she _needed_ him to understand this. 'I can't lose my job for _anything._ '

James didn't seem to have anything to say to that — he just continued to pace slowly back and forth over the small porch.

'What do you want me to say?' She was pleading with him. Pleading with him to _please_ stop making this harder than it already was. Pleading with him to understand where she was coming from, to just sit on this and let it fade, to give these other women a proper chance.

It wasn't what she wanted, it wasn't even _remotely_ what she wanted, but it was what had to happen. The alternative —

'I —' James paused for a moment, raked a hand through his hair. 'I don't know. I don't know, I don't know, I don't know.'

James pressed the heels of his hands to his forehead, resumed his pacing, and silence fell between them again. It was tense and uncomfortable, and Lily wanted nothing more than to turn on her heel and start down the street as quickly as humanly possible.

But she'd run away from this conversation the last time they'd had it and spent the subsequent days on edge waiting for him to bring it up again.

They needed to finish it this time.

'James.'

He stopped dead the moment she said his name and her resolve slipped a bit when he looked down at her, his eyes wide and stressed and anxious, like he knew what she was going to say before she said it.

'James, I'm not doing this with you. You signed a contract, we both did, at the start of this show, and — and I can't back out on that. You'll — you'll get over this. Whatever _this_ is. You'll get over it and fall in love with Liza or Summer or whoever and then this'll all seem like some ridiculous thing. I want you to give that a chance because I'm not doing this.'

James watched her lips as she spoke, but Lily couldn't tell whether or not he'd actually heard a single word that she'd said.

That is, she couldn't until it seemed like whatever was holding him up decided to just give up and she watched him literally shut down.

His expression went completely blank and he nodded slowly. His hands, she noticed just before he stuffed them into his pockets, were trembling, and he was so — she wanted to —

James cleared his throat, exhaled heavily, and when he looked up at her, he gave her a sad, vacant smile that absolutely broke her heart.

'Goodnight, Lily. I'll see you tomorrow morning.'

James shut the door softly behind him when he went inside, and Lily hovered on the threshold for a moment as she tried to decide what to do.

She couldn't, as she was now half tempted to do, walk back into James' parents' house, grab him by the arm, and snog him until he accepted her apology. She couldn't tell him she didn't mean it. She couldn't take it back.

She couldn't do any of the things that she wanted to do.

So, because her hotel was only half a mile away, Lily stuffed her hands into her pockets and started down James' street towards the Thames.


	25. Chapter 24

**welcome backkkkk x**

* * *

When Lily met James the next morning, a little before eight, he looked absolutely exhausted.

She couldn't say that she blamed him — she, too, had slept like utter shite the night before because she'd kept turning everything over and over in her mind. At first she'd tried to ignore it, but when she realised that there was going to be no ignoring it, she hoped that she could at least think it through enough that she would run out of things to think about and allow her to find some kind of peace about the whole thing.

It went without saying that that, too, was wildly unsuccessful.

Still, she'd been determined to show up at James' house that morning with a smile on her face and to act as though nothing had happened the night before. That had all gone out the window when she noticed James leaning up against the side wall of the house, his hand in his hair and bags under his eyes that she could see from the damn street.

She left Benjy in the middle of the drive sorting out mic packs and camera cords and marched over to the small porch where James was standing, dropped her hands onto her hips in a clearly annoyed sort of way. She knew that being cross with him probably wasn't the best way to handle things, but it was the only way she could think to keep herself distant. To keep from going back over everything they'd talked about, to keep from hashing it all out again until they came to a different conclusion.

'What's wrong with you?'

James grabbed a mug of tea from the trio of cups off the small table out front and handed it to her. Lily just raised an eyebrow at him. James ignored her and grabbed his own mug off the table and took a sip.

'Why do you look so tired?'

James raised an eyebrow at her. 'Really?'

Lily cleared her throat, turned her mug awkwardly in her hands.

James breathed another sigh. 'Let's just get this over with.'

They spent the next hour or so filming a few greeting scenes with James' parents — Lily made sure to get a few options so that they could decide what they liked best in post. She was partial to the one they'd shot first, when Euphemia opened the door and smiled and pulled James into a hug before calling for Fleamont, but the one where Sirius opened the door and screamed loudly enough that he woke the entire street also had its merits.

Lily and James barely said more than a dozen words to one another the entire morning. She could feel everyone watching them, Benjy in particular seemed to be shooting her a lot of looks, but Lily was determined to behave as though everything was completely normal.

Even if everything was a little awkward right now, James would eventually get over it and then everything would be fine. He would eventually get over her and then he'd go back to focusing on finding himself a wife.

No matter how determined she was, though, things were still off when they wrapped at the house and started pulling together plans to head over to Twickenham Green for the group date. It wasn't far from where James' parents' lived and they could walk, but Lily wasn't sure if they wanted to be drawing that kind of attention to themselves, especially because they'd managed to fly under the radar so far in terms of media coverage.

She'd tried to get James' opinion on the matter, but every time she asked him or even _looked_ like she was going to ask him, James either looked away or came up with an excuse to leave.

Lily eventually decided to ask Sirius for his opinion, which turned out to be a mistake because he insisted that they shouldn't give a damn about drawing attention to themselves.

In the end, though, Lily didn't fight it too much. She was too damn tired to bother with it.

She reminded James and Sirius (mostly Sirius) about a thousand times that they were mic'd and that everything they said would be available for use in the final cut, and she hung back beside Benjy as James and Sirius started down the street towards the main road. Lily had her headphones on one ear so that she could hear what James and Sirius were talking about, but she was doing her best not to pay attention, especially once conversation turned to the women on the show.

Luckily, Benjy decided to make it really easy on her.

'What's going on with you and Potter?'

He shot her a quick look before he turned back to the camera and Lily sighed. There really was no point trying to lie to him.

'We had an argument last night.'

'About?'

'You know what about.'

They fell silent as they crossed the street, and she hoped that might be it, but Benjy brought it up again the moment they were safely on the pavement opposite.

'So he knows you have feelings for him then? He didn't take it well?'

Lily shook her head. 'He, uh — he has feelings for me, too, apparently.'

Benjy turned, shocked. Even his jaw had dropped a little. 'You're fucking kidding.'

'I wish I was.'

'What are you going to do? Is he backing out of the show?'

Lily breathed a laugh. 'God. no. He signed a contract. There's no way out now.'

'So what are you going to do?'

'I told him last night to forget about it and move on. Go back to finding himself a wife.'

Benjy frowned. 'Lil. You don't mean that.'

They paused a few metres back from James and Sirius, who were waiting at the Hampton Road junction ahead of them.

'No,' Lily said as they started walking, 'I don't. But it's what he needs to do. There's no point in us ruining our lives because of a fling.'

Benjy was quiet as they walked across the street, didn't say anything as they walked through the wall into the Green. Lily had just started to think that maybe Benjy was going to drop it, when he switched off his camera and turned to look at her.

'I think we both know that this isn't just a fling.'

He walked off to join the rest of the camera crew before Lily could think of anything to say to that.

The Green was already full of people when they arrived — the standing cameras had all been set up strategically around the park and there were a few other steadicam operators (besides poor Benjy) milling around in the centre where the contestants were standing.

Most everyone was there on the Green today, save Summer, Anja, and Jade, the three women going on smaller, more intimate dates this week. Lily was sure that they were enjoying the quiet at the contestant house a few blocks away and didn't expect that they were even remotely upset about missing today's festivities.

Despite having pulled together all the details for the date that was about to unfold, Lily still wasn't entirely sure what exactly it was that James and Sirius were planning. She knew that it was some kind of game that they'd cooked up, but she hadn't, not even in her questioning last night, been able to get anything solid out of either of them.

She tried not to wonder about the lines of cones, clumps of random sporting equipment, and random paddling pools around the Green that Sirius had requested they fill with "things like jelly and custard and shaving cream". If she pretended they weren't there, then maybe they wouldn't factor into anything that they were doing today.

After a few more minutes milling around, Jax called everyone to order. He directed James and Sirius to the front of the group and, after a bit of fidgeting from the contestant's, finally started shooting.

'Hello everyone,' Sirius beamed at the group as he raised his arm and wrapped it around James' shoulders. 'I'm Sirius Black. The hotter Potter.'

James, to his credit, just snorted instead of immediately throwing off Sirius' arm.

Sirius sent James a winning smile, and James just rolled his eyes, shook his head. 'You're an idiot.'

'You love me. Now anyway — ladies,' Sirius turned back to the contestants and grinned broadly, stepping away from James and dropping his hands onto his hips as he surveyed the women in front of him. 'Today, we're going to play a little game.'

Lily heard James groan from where she was standing, and a few of the contestants laughed at his reaction. This, however, just seemed to spur Sirius on — he shot James a mischievous smile before he turned back to the contestants.

'We're going to play two truths and a lie, James Potter edition. Whoever wins the most points wins my esteem, the most valuable prize on offer, and probably a nice snog from James over here.'

'A hug,' James interrupted, holding up his hands and glaring at Sirius. 'You win a hug.'

Sirius rolled his eyes. 'You're no fun.'

James stuffed his hands into his pockets and smirked. 'Sorry to disappoint.'

'You aren't sorry at all, you big prat, don't lie to me.'

James just shook his head in amusement before he turned to the contestants. 'I'm sorry in advance for inflicting him on you.'

The next few hours were some of the most chaotic they'd had since they'd started shooting. Sirius' loud, outgoing personality made the contestants all that much more over-the-top, you could hardly get a word in between all the shouting and laughing going on across the set, and Lily could tell that James was having an impossible time following the rules of the game that Sirius had set up to test everyone.

Because the trouble was that the game didn't seem to have any hard and fast rules — sometimes Sirius made contestants grab a card from the stack of red action cards, sometimes they picked "confession" cards, sometimes they didn't pick any cards at all. There was no rhyme or reason to the structure of the game, and Lily suspected that Sirius might have done it that way on purpose, to see who was going to just go with the chaos of the game and who was going to challenge him on his complete lack of structure and organisation.

It was hard to tell which reaction he was hoping for, because he didn't seem to be particularly taken with anyone.

Sirius was mildly impressed when Liza could rattle off James' football stats from his 2012 season with Reading (James had laughed and said that _he_ couldn't even remember that and was impressed that Liza remembered), he'd laughed when Hannah had crafted some detailed and ridiculous story about "how James had gotten that scar on his left elbow — the more nonsense the better", but he didn't really seem like he was truly connecting with any of the contestants.

Maybe he was just taking this seriously and was trying to keep from being over the top about his approval, but somehow, Lily didn't think that was the case.

When Sirius' bland tolerance of the contestants went out the window a few hours into the shoot, though, Lily would've paid him any amount of money to get it back.

She should have known, when Laura had ended up on the group date list for this week, that it would have meant trouble. She should have filed a last minute change last night when she'd met Sirius and realised just how… opinionated he was, but she'd thought that it would be fine, that maybe Laura would behave herself, that maybe Sirius would be able to let it go if anything happened because James would absolutely have her head if she'd made him put Laura on the two on one (or, even worse, the solo date).

She was an idiot. An absolute fucking idiot.

Because anything, even James raining hellfire down on her for making him go on a solo date with Laura, would have been better than what actually happened.

Rachel had been in the middle of one of Sirius' bizarre "action card" stunts (she'd had to run through the jelly paddling pool and then kick a football through a narrow set of cones twenty metres away), when Laura had, quite obviously to _everyone_ on set, stuck her foot out and tripped Rachel just as she ran out of the jelly.

Rachel managed to catch herself and avoid breaking her nose, but only just.

And then Rachel hopped up off the ground, swearing up a storm with her fists up, and James had to jump in to break it up (largely because the producers were now under firm orders _not_ to intervene if it looked like someone was going to throw a punch from now on). James barely managed to avoid getting hit in the jaw with Rachel's left hook, Laura started shouting obscenities behind James' back and claiming innocence, and then Sirius, because he couldn't have left well enough alone, marched over there screaming.

And, because that wasn't bad enough, he then took a scoop of jelly out of the paddling pool and dropped it unceremoniously onto Laura's head.

'Oh my god,' Lily pressed the heels of her hands into her forehead and willed the scene to go back to how it had been just a few minutes ago. 'Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god, this isn't happening.'

But it was happening and now all hell was breaking loose.

Laura was screaming that Sirius had attacked her, Sirius was laughing madly, and James now had one hand around Rachel's arm and another in the centre of Sirius' chest and he was shouting, 'Can we cut the shot please? Can we cut the fucking shot?'

Jax, finally, cut the shot, and one of the producers ran forward to take Rachel off James' hands. He immediately whipped around to look at Sirius.

Sirius didn't even look at James, just narrowed his eyes at Laura behind James' back. 'I don't like you.'

'Sirius, come on.' James made a good show of it, but it was clear to everyone that could see him that he was just barely biting back a laugh, and Sirius immediately pounced on James' lack of genuine outrage.

'No, James. No. This arsehole comes into our house —'

'Sirius, we're in the park.'

'— _into our house_ and she's treating other people like that? Not in front of me.'

'Well, you didn't have to drop jelly on her head.'

'Oh please, it didn't hurt her. And anyway, she deserved it. She could've broken Rachel's nose!'

James didn't seem to have anything to say to that, and Sirius took that as an admission that he'd done the right thing.

He patted James on the arm. 'I knew you'd see sense, mate.'

'Sirius —'

'Come now,' Sirius smiled winningly at him and Lily watched James tip his head to the side and start shaking his head. 'Are you really going to be cross with me? I didn't do anything you haven't been thinking about for weeks.'

* * *

The next two dates, thankfully, were nowhere _near_ as insane as the group date had been.

It was a really, really fucking low bar, but Lily would take any tiny victory at this point.

Her victory was only mildly marred by the fact that James was still refusing to talk to her for more than a few minutes at a time.

He would nod hello when he climbed into the car in the morning, would listen whenever Lily was giving him directions about the shoot or something work related, but otherwise he sat silently, arms crossed, and looked out the window until they got to wherever they were going and he could barrel out of the car without looking back.

Lily would've felt bad for Benjy having to sit through it if she wasn't so busy feeling miserable for herself.

Despite the fact that he was dead set on ignoring her, James had a nice, quiet picnic in Richmond Park with Summer and Jade on Thursday, and he took Anja to Hampton Court to see the Great Vine and have a picnic on the grounds on Friday.

He'd thought, and he'd been right, that Anja would appreciate the dedication to the vine that the gardners showed, chef as she was. She was only disappointed that they weren't there in September when the grapes were ready for harvest.

Lily (and Anja) both noticed that James didn't promise to bring her back.

When Lily woke up on Saturday morning, someone was banging a bit harder than necessary on her door.

She groaned into her pillow when the knocking stopped, was just about to get comfortable again when whoever'd been knocking said, 'Lil!' and started pounding on the door again.

Fucking Marlene.

Though the last thing that she really felt like doing was getting out of bed, Lily knew Marlene well enough to know that she wasn't going to go away until she answered the door.

She yanked back the duvet, pulled herself out of bed, and shuffled across the room towards the door.

Marlene was standing in a bright leggings and sports bra set when Lily opened the door, a light zip up covering most of her top and her hair in a high ponytail. She smiled brightly at Lily when she opened the door and said, 'Good morning!' as she slid past her into the room.

'This is hardly a good morning.' Lily shut the door and turned to follow Marlene through the room, didn't bother asking Marlene what she was doing when she started digging through Lily's case looking for god knows what.

'You're so dramatic.' Marlene didn't have to look up for Lily to know that she'd rolled her eyes.

'You were pounding on the door,' Lily said, as she fell backwards onto the bed and closed her eyes. 'I was dead asleep.'

'Well, maybe that's your fault for being asleep at six thirty.'

'Fuck, Mar, it's six thirty? I don't have to be up until ten.'

'I know,' Marlene said, 'but I have something fun for us to do, so you have to get up. And you've been avoiding me for the last, like, _week_ , so you don't have a choice.'

Something soft landed on Lily's stomach and she groped blindly for whatever it was, held it up so that she could see.

'Why the fuck do I need a sports bra? I'm not working out with you, Marlene, the last time nearly killed me.'

Marlene rolled her eyes. 'That's called sweating, Lily, it's good for you.'

'Is it good if I'm suffering? And it was more than just sweating — you made us climb a fucking mountain!'

'Whatever, anyway,' Marlene tossed something else at Lily from her bag, a pair of leggings, and resumed digging. 'I found an outdoor yoga class in the park and I signed us up.'

'Why did you sign me up before you asked if I wanted to go?'

Marlene rolled her eyes again. 'Because,' she stood up and leaned against the chest of drawers opposite Lily's bed, 'you always complain about these things at the start, but then we go and do them and you enjoy yourself.'

'I did _not_ enjoy the mountain —'

'You enjoyed the second _half_ of the mountain,' Marlene said. 'It was… just a bit rough at the start.'

Lily hummed sarcastically and Marlene sighed. 'Look, I just think that you could use a bit of space at this point. Go outside, get some time away from the show, stretch it out —'

'How am I getting time away from the show if you're going to be there?'

Marlene shot her a look. 'As your very best friend, I hope you know how hurtful that is.'

Lily snorted and Marlene grinned.

'Just,' Marlene sighed, 'just come with me! It'll be fun. And you _really_ need it.'

'Gee, thanks.'

'I'm just saying that you need to breatheeee,' Marlene took a deep breath to illustrate her point. 'You've been so stressed and you haven't done anything but follow James around for weeks. _I've_ barely even seen you.'

'My _job_ is to follow James around.'

'Yes,' Marlene said, 'but it isn't your job twenty four hours a day.'

Lily knew that she was right, but she couldn't help but mildly obsess over all the things that could possibly go wrong in her absence.

She sighed. 'Mar, we just _really_ don't have time to be doing anything like that today. We have the ceremony tonight — '

'Lily.' Marlene held up her hand and shot her a stern look. 'The ceremony is _tonight_ — we have hours and hours before we even need to start doing anything. You can take an hour for yourself this morning.'

'We don't have yoga mats.'

Marlene waved a dismissive hand. 'I've already gotten that taken care of.'

Of course she fucking had.

'But —'

Marlene crossed her arms. 'James will be fine without you for an hour.'

Lily frowned. 'I didn't say anything about James.'

'You were going to.'

'No, I wasn't.'

Marlene rolled her eyes. 'Uh huh. Look, let's just go, the class starts in like half an hour and it's a fifteen minute walk from here. And I'm not taking no for an answer because _you've been avoiding me_ and I'm fucking tired of you and your shit, so come on.'

Recognising a pointless battle when she saw one, Lily changed into her workout things and followed Marlene out the door.

The yoga class was in the smaller, triangular section of Twickenham Green. They'd been in the other half of the Green when they'd met Sirius for that group date a few days before, and Lily was surprised at how quiet the park was at this hour of the day.

Though, she was also fairly positive that _everything_ seemed quiet when Sirius wasn't around throwing jelly at people's heads.

There was a small crowd of people around a pair of benches underneath the trees at the edge of the Green, and Lily and Marlene started across the grass towards them. A few people turned and shot them looks as they approached, sans yoga mats as they were, but one woman walked over to them, her long dark brown hair swinging behind her in a high ponytail, and smiled.

'Hi, Marlene.'

Marlene grinned and Lily shot Marlene a confused look which Marlene ignored.

'Hey, Dorcas. How've you been?'

'Great,' Dorcas was practically bouncing on her toes as she spoke. 'I've got your yoga mats right here,' she pointed at two mats leaning up against the side of the bench nearest them. 'Just give them a good rub down when class is over, yeah? They belong to my housemates.'

Marlene nodded. 'Sure thing. And thanks again for this.'

Dorcas beamed at them. 'It's no problem! I'm just glad you texted! I know you've been busy lately…'

Marlene stepped forward and rested her hand on Dorcas' elbow. 'The filming has been _mad._ We're about halfway through shooting, though, so I'll be back in London for good in a few weeks.'

Lily knew Marlene well enough to know when to make herself scare, so she smiled her thanks at Dorcas for the yoga mat (Dorcas didn't seem to even notice that Lily existed) and walked across the grass to find a soft spot to roll out her mat.

A number of people had already rolled out their mats, so Lily moved towards what she thought might be the back of class, pulled off the shoulder strap, and rolled the mat out onto the ground.

Most everyone else in class was milling around and chatting, but Lily was still half asleep and mildly overwhelmed, and so she took the opportunity to sit cross-legged on her mat and avoid human interaction.

Maybe she'd look like she was meditating.

She put her hands, palms up, on her knees and closed her eyes.

She wasn't sure how long she was sitting there (it felt like fucking ages, but might have only been a minute or two), when she heard someone start rustling next to her.

She opened her eyes and found Marlene smirking down at her.

'Getting in touch with your inner yogi, I see.'

Lily held up her fingers at her and leaned back onto her hands so she could look Marlene in the eye.

'I'm not the only one trying to get in touch with a yogi.'

Marlene snorted. 'That was weak.'

'Yeah well,' Lily waved a hand. 'You woke me up early. I'm too tired to be clever.'

Marlene rolled her eyes and Lily grinned. 'So. Where'd you meet Dorcas?'

Marlene smiled then, a warm, soft smile that Lily hadn't seen on her face in a long time.

'Spin. We've been in the same class for, like, two months, but I only just worked up the courage to say more than, "Wow, I love you spin shoes, where did you get them?" the week before we left to start filming.'

'Have you gone on a date yet?'

Marlene shook her head. 'We did our sleepover and then I had that date with Derek the American — I guess we could've done it Wednesday night, but... I didn't want to start something with her and then leave for two months.'

Lily had been trying to contain her smile because she knew how Marlene got whenever she was genuinely excited about someone, but she couldn't help it then. 'You want to have time for it to get serious.'

'I —' Marlene reached up and tightened her ponytail. 'Shut up.'

Lily leaned forward and smacked Marlene's calf. 'You're in looooove.'

Marlene shot her a look, but it was softened by the blush now colouring her cheeks. 'Shut up, I am not. You're just projecting.'

Lily raised an eyebrow. 'How am I projecting?'

'Seriously?'

Lily nodded. 'Seriously.'

'You know,' Marlene started casually stretching her arms, 'you might've been ignoring me for the last week and a half, but I've been paying mighty close attention to you, _Evans_.'

She really should've known better than to engage Marlene on this. She wouldn't have said something if she didn't have the evidence to back it up.

Maybe if she played it casual it would all go away.

'Oh?'

Marlene nodded, lifted up her right foot and started stretching her quad.

'It's been pretty interesting, that's for sure.'

Lily pushed herself up off her hands and crossed her arms. 'If you've got something to say, Marlene, just say it. There's no sense in messing me about.'

'Fine.' Marlene dropped her foot and frowned down at Lily. 'You've got every single one of your feelings for him written all over your damn face, and I know you don't want to get fired and you're not the careless type. You —'

'Alright everyone,' another woman that Lily assumed was the instructor clapped her hands together and Lily clicked her tongue in mock disappointment ('Guess we'll have to continue this later') as she stood, 'we're going to start today's practice in mountain pose, tadasana, stand up nice and tall, hands at heart centre, and take a deep breath in…'

They both worked themselves into the proper posture, and Lily let her eyes flutter closed, tried to focus on her breathing.

It would have been a lot easier to do that if Marlene hadn't started hissing to her name to get her attention.

Lily opened her eyes and shot Marlene a look intent on getting her to shut up, but that was, apparently, a mistake.

'Lily, _honestly,_ ' Marlene said, her voice louder than it should have been now that the class had actually started, 'you can't sit here and tell me that you don't have serious feelings for him.'

'Smooth, deep breaths now, everyone,' the instructor was walking through the aisles and shot Marlene a quick look, 'we've got an intense practice ahead of us, so I really want you to get in touch with your breath…'

'Lily,' Marlene dropped her voice to a whisper, 'come on.'

'What,' Lily hissed back, 'do you want me to say?'

'Alright everyone, now we're going to stretch our arms up towards the sky, wiggle those fingers, reach, reach, reach, and, send your arms out wide into a deep forward fold…'

Marlene turned so she could catch Lily's eye, reached over so that her ponytail fell to the other side of her head. 'I'm just saying,' Marlene whispered as they lifted into the next pose, 'I thought this was a fling, but it's obviously more than that. For both of you.'

Lily was grateful that they'd dropped into plank and she had a reason to avert her eyes.

She looked at Marlene again once they'd gotten in downward facing dog, blew a stray piece of hair out of her eyes. 'Nothing is going to happen between us,' she hissed, 'so there's no point in arguing about this.'

Marlene scoffed and opened up her mouth to reply, but the instructor walked past again and she stayed silent.

Lily had started to hope that Marlene was going to actually let her enjoy the rest of her yoga practice, but they'd just moved into their warrior sequence when Marlene started up again.

'You want me to tell you how I know that this is more than just a fling?' she asked, turning her head to catch Lily's eye as they lifted up into their pose.

'Not really,' Lily said, and she shut her eyes, pulled in a deep breath, tried to focus on something other than Marlene's badgering (and the fact that her legs were already screaming at her).

They opened up into the next posture, and Lily realised that Marlene was running the poses in the opposite direction so that she could maintain eye contact with Lily.

'He makes you laugh,' Marlene whispered, ' _a lot._ And even when you're pissed off at him, it's obvious that you find him charming.'

Lily didn't feel the need to dignify that with a response.

'And,' Marlene continued, 'you seek him out.'

'What,' Lily said, a bit louder than she should have, 'I do not.'

'You do,' Marlene said, falling quiet for a moment as the instructor passed by and shot them both a stern look, 'you do. Whenever you have news or want to chat or literally anything, you go looking for him first.'

'I do not.'

She did.

The instructor called a water break a few minutes later and, as she was basically pouring sweat, Lily was one of the first off her mat towards the bench where her water bottle was waiting for her. Marlene grabbed her elbow and tugged her a bit farther away from the rest of the class.

'I know you don't want to hear it,' Marlene said, 'and I know that it's complicated — '

'Complicated? Mar, complicated doesn't even begin to — '

Marlene waved her off. 'I know, I know. And I know that I was the one that yelled at you about this whole thing, but Lily — if this isn't just a fling, you have to do something about it. Because in case you haven't noticed, he likes you, too.'

The instructor called them back to class before Lily could say anything in response.

Marlene was silent for the rest of their practice.


	26. Chapter 25

**you can all thank ohk4te on tumblr for this chapter. She is literal sunshine**

 **(and thanks, as always, to scaredofrobots who fedora'ed this again this week and left me keyboard smashes for days. I love you infinitely)**

* * *

Lily didn't tell Marlene that she knew for a fact that James returned her feelings. She didn't say anything at all as they wiped down their mats and handed them back to Dorcas, didn't say anything on their walk back to the hotel.

She knew that Marlene was waiting for her to say something, but Lily wasn't sure _what_ to say.

And anyway, it didn't matter, because she'd already told James that nothing was going to happen between them. And now he wasn't talking to her, so what was even the point in continuing to obsess about this?

Lily took a quick shower and grabbed breakfast from the hotel restaurant, but she still had a fair bit of time to kill before she had to be over at the Potters' place for the family interviews that afternoon. Normally (last series normally, anyway), she would have gone up to Marlene's room and sat and chatted for a few hours, but today, she really just wanted to be alone.

She walked out of the hotel and crossed the street towards the gardens opposite. She ran her hand along the surrounding brick wall as she walked, looked out over the expanse of bright green grass. She could just make out the river beyond the willows lining the path that ran the bank, and she decided that, as soon as she reached the gate, she was going to turn in and walk there for a while.

Then she spotted the Majestic Wine Warehouse across the street and thought that maybe _that_ would be a better place to spend her time that morning.

She walked through the iron gate when she reached the garden entrance and started down the path, past the blooming patch of wildflowers, towards the trail that ran along the river. There were a few kids and their parents in the play area a few metres away, a few people were walking dogs throughout the park, but the morning was mostly quiet and Lily was mostly alone.

She turned onto the path by the river and she could just hear the movement of the water over the traffic on the road behind her.

Part of her wanted to tell Marlene about what was going on with James — she wanted to talk about it, really talk about it, and she wanted to talk about it with her best friend. She knew that Marlene, if Lily confided in her, would try to help her find a way out of this whole damn situation, would probably try to get James off the show, but Marlene wouldn't be able to prevent the lawsuit or Lily's firing or any of the other terrible things that Lily let herself imagine when she started thinking about her and James seriously giving this thing between them a go.

Keeping it to herself meant that she didn't have any options moving forward, but it also meant that she didn't get her hopes up.

And anyway, she'd already told James that nothing was going to happen between them. She couldn't go back on that now, not after she'd been so damn insistent about the whole thing.

And maybe she shouldn't have been so firm in her refusal to consider this... this relationship, but really, how could it end well? The stress and the pressure of the lawsuits and everything else they would have to go through just to get together would put so much strain on the relationship that Lily knew it would fall apart before it really even got going. And how was she supposed to enter into relationship like that, one that she knew was destined to fail before it even got off the ground?

It was better this way. It had to be better this way.

Lily walked up and down the path beside the Thames for the better part of an hour before she finally sighed and started to make her way home. Thinking it over and over and _over_ wasn't going to make any difference and she really should head over to the Potters' anyway.

When Lily arrived outside the Potters' half an hour later, the house was a veritable flurry of activity, especially after her quiet morning by the river. There were a number of cars parked along the street that Lily knew belonged to production and several people walking in and out of the house as Lily started up the drive.

The door was open when she climbed the stairs, but she still knocked firmly on the wood and announced herself as she walked in.

'Euphemia? I'm here.'

'We're in the kitchen, Lily, darling!'

Lily slid through the hallway, now two feet narrower because of the lights they'd set up, and into the kitchen. James, because of course her eyes found him first, was pouring water into a large teapot on the far side of the kitchen, and Euphemia, Fleamont, Sirius, and Remus were all set at the table.

James looked up when she walked in and his eyes met hers. And she knew she shouldn't be looking at him, not like she was, not when she'd told him two days ago that there was no point to this thing brewing between them, not when he'd spent the last few days ignoring her, not when his entire family was sitting at the kitchen table and could very easily see the fact that she was looking at him like he was water and she'd just crawled out of the fucking desert.

She shouldn't be looking at him like she was, but that seemed to be a theme of this thing of theirs.

And anyway, how could she care about what she was supposed to be doing when he was looking at her like that, like her walking into the room had shifted his world on its axis?

He looked away and resumed making the tea.

Lily smiled at everyone at the table.

'How's everyone today?' She sounded more cheerful than usual, and she hoped that no one knew she was compensating.

'Just lovely,' Euphemia smiled at her. 'How're you, Lily?'

Remus pulled out a chair next to him and Lily muttered her thanks as she sat down.

'I'm alright. Marlene dragged me out of bed at half six to go to yoga this morning, so I'm a bit more exhausted than I'd like.'

'Marlene McKinnon?!'

Sirius was gaping at her and Lily laughed. 'Yeah. Why? You a fan?'

Remus rolled his eyes and jumped in before Sirius could reply. 'He's only worshipped her her entire career.'

Sirius smacked Remus' bicep. 'Stop, you're embarrassing me.'

Remus shot him a look. ' _This_ embarrasses you? _Nothing_ embarrasses you.'

Sirius crossed his arms and leaned back in his seat. 'I don't like what you're insinuating.'

'Oh?' Lily could just catch the arch of Remus' eyebrow as he turned to face Sirius. 'And what am I insinuating?'

'That I'm somehow less than the warm, sensitive soul that we both know me to be.'

Everyone around the table burst out laughing, and Sirius started pouting. 'I hate the lot of you.'

James brought the tea tray over and set it in the centre of the table before he took his seat beside his father at the opposite end of the table. He was directly in Lily's line of sight, but she was determined to keep her eyes off of him again, at least as much as she could manage.

She looked up when he handed her her mug.

That was about it.

Once everyone's tea had been passed around, Lily cleared her throat. 'Alright, so I just wanted to go over a few things before we get started this afternoon.' Everyone nodded and Lily continued. 'We'll set you up in the lounge as soon as they're finished lighting it, and we just want you to have a nice, easy conversation with James about the journey so far — what it's been like, what he's thinking, where his heart's at, that sort of thing.'

James tapped his spoon against the side of his mug and Lily's eyes flickered to his for a moment before she scanned the rest of the table.

'Any questions?'

'Do we get information about any of these women?' Fleamont asked. 'Our son has been rather tight lipped about the whole thing, so I'm not sure we'll have much to go on.'

'I have files on everyone in my mobile if you need information on someone and James can't remember. We can also give you some background about what's been happening since they got on the show, give the illusion that you and James have talked about these women at length.'

'That's what ninety-nine per cent of this show is, Dad.' James' tone was incredibly bitter and Lily looked down at the mug in her hands to avoid seeing any part of his expression. 'This whole damn thing is an illusion.'

Everyone went quiet. There was just the sound of the crew setting up in the house around them and the uncomfortable shifting of mugs against the table to break the silence.

Finally, Sirius leaned across the table to look at Lily.

'So, I've got a question.'

Lily cleared her throat. 'Shoot.'

'How many of the women at the group date thought I was fit as fuck?'

Thank god for Sirius Black.

They chatted for a while longer before Lily gathered everyone from the table and herded them into the lounge. It took them a few minutes until they were seated just so, Remus in the armchair, Sirius balancing on the arm, James, Euphemia, and Fleamont on the sofa. It took them awhile to relax under the cameras, for them to start speaking to one another in a way that sounded even remotely natural, but Lily just sat in a chair off screen and lobbed questions at them, occasionally throwing in something cheeky whenever they started going stiff again.

It hadn't been easy, though, sitting there and listening to James talk about these women. He knew that he and Liza got along, but hearing him talk about her… hearing him say how kind she was, how funny, how beautiful, how he wondered what her parents were like to have raised someone as wonderful as she was… hearing him think about her outside of the context of the show, to start wondering at the other pieces that made her up… it nearly made Lily's heart give out.

But she was determined to put on a brave face, was determined to sit there and continue to do her job, because this was what she wanted, wasn't it? She'd told James that she wanted him to start being more serious about the women on the show, she told him that she wanted him to pursue them, to get over her and let his relationships with the contestants develop.

That wasn't going to happen if she kept freaking out about it whenever he made any kind of progress with them. She was going to need to be happy and supportive and encourage him to continue working on it.

It didn't matter if it was quietly killing her, it was what she was going to have to do.

It took them a few hours to get all the footage Lily thought they might need — she had a lot of really, really great clips, things that they could definitely use in promo material, and she was congratulating herself on an incredibly professional job well done when Euphemia crossed the lounge towards her.

'Lily,' she dropped her voice and leaned in a bit, 'I was wondering if I might be able to have a word.'

She hoped to god that the panic that had started twisting in her stomach didn't show on her face. 'Yeah, sure. Of course.'

Euphemia took her elbow and led her out behind the cameras, into the kitchen, and through the back door into the garden. Lily shut the door behind them while Euphemia reached back and started tugging at her microphone wire.

So that was how it was going to be.

There was a pair of chairs at the end of the patio, and Euphemia sat in one and gestured towards the other. 'Please, have a seat.'

Lily sat.

Euphemia reached up and smoothed the fabric of her hijab, then folded her hands in her lap before unfolding them again and twisting her wedding band around her finger.

If Lily had had any question about which of his parents James more closely resembled, this moment would have told her everything she needed to know.

She wasn't sure why Euphemia had asked to speak with her — she'd thought, at first, that she knew something about how Lily felt though how she would've had any idea, she wasn't sure. Unless, of course James had said something...

But James wouldn't have said anything. He wasn't stupid enough to start talking about them — they weren't even a _them_ — and with the way he'd been looking at her the past few days? There was no way that he was going around and talking about her to his mother.

She had no idea what Euphemia was planning or what she was obviously so nervous about, and though Lily wanted to jump in and say something, _anything_ to break the silence, she wasn't sure where to begin or what to say and so she just sat there, the nerves winding tighter and tighter in her gut as Euphemia sat silently next to her, twisting her wedding band around and around and gathering her thoughts.

'My son wears his heart on his sleeve,' Euphemia said at last, and Lily's heart climbed into her throat. 'I worried about him coming on this kind of show because I knew it would be painfully obvious to everyone the moment he started falling for someone.'

Oh god.

'That isn't to say that I thought he'd be cruel or even unkind to the other women on the show. It's just that he's never been able to hide the way he feels, and I worried that the other women would be upset once they realised where his affections lie.'

She paused for a long moment like she was waiting for Lily to say something, but Lily didn't say anything. She couldn't even if she'd wanted to — her mouth was too dry and she couldn't quite breathe.

Euphemia folded her hands again and leaned forward in her seat.

'Lily, I knew from the moment James introduced you. The way he looks at you —' Euphemia shook her head, a small smile tugging at her lips. 'I've never seen him look at anyone like that before. And I wouldn't have bothered telling you about this, but I don't think James is alone in feeling this way.'

Lily pulled in a sharp breath and wiped hurriedly at her eyes.

She hadn't — why in the fuck was she crying?

'Shit, sorry.' She brushed away another tear and swallowed hard. Euphemia reached over and took Lily's hands in her own and squeezed, and Lily looked up at the sky, blinked back more tears, and started shouting at herself in her head to get it together.

This was absurd. This was fucking absurd. She had nothing to be crying about. She had nothing to be crying about and she was not about to start sobbing her bloody eyes out in front of this woman she didn't even know.

'I know this is hard,' Euphemia said, and her tone, soft and loving and kind, wasn't doing anything to stop the tears still leaking from the corners of Lily's eyes. 'I know this is hard, and I'm sorry if I'm over-stepping, but Lily — if you both feel the way that you seem to feel about one another… I don't understand what you're doing, continuing on with this.'

Lily pulled in a slow, shaky breath and squeezed her eyes shut. When she opened them and saw the look on Euphemia's face — _god._ She desperately wanted to give her a different answer.

But she had to be consistent. She couldn't give Euphemia hope when she hadn't even given it to James.

'I — we talked about it. In Scotland. And then again when we got here. Out on the porch that first night. I — we can't. We just can't.'

Lily expected Euphemia to let go of her hands, to scoff or say something annoyed or to do something, _anything_ that showed how ridiculous she thought Lily's decision was. So when Euphemia squeezed Lily's hands again and she nodded slowly and said, 'That's up to you. To both of you,' Lily started crying again.

'I'm sorry,' Lily said. Euphemia let go of her hands so she could wipe her eyes. 'I'm sorry, I — I don't know why I'm crying.'

'You don't need to apologise for crying, Lily.' Euphemia put a hand on Lily's knee. 'It's a lot. And I'm sure you haven't been talking about this with anyone, so you're just overwhelmed.'

'And I just —' Lily sucked in a sharp breath. 'I want to be able to give him a different answer. But — the situation, it's — there's nothing we can do.'

'Are you sure there's nothing? Nothing at all?'

Lily breathed a laugh. 'He'll get sued for everything he's worth and I'll lose my job and we'll both get dragged through the PR mud until there's no way we resurface. I — I don't want him to have to go through that.'

'Does James know that?'

'I tell him he'll get sued, like, every other day.'

'What does he say about that?'

'He says he doesn't care.'

Euphemia chuckled, shook her head. 'Of course he doesn't.'

She was quiet for a minute before she took a deep breath. 'Lily, I'm not going to tell you what to do. But if James is ready to deal with whatever fallout the two of you going public might cause… you don't have to protect him from that. If he says he's ready and he wants to go into it anyway, then he means it. It's just a matter of what _you_ want to do. And that doesn't mean you have to follow James into the fire and it doesn't mean that you are any less for wanting to stay out of it. Truth be told, James needs a steadying influence like that sometimes. He has a tendency to jump into things head first and ask questions later, especially when his heart's involved.

'But if you're only avoiding it because you're scared or you're afraid of what other people will say… if all your reservations have to do with other people, maybe just… rethink a few things. See if might not be worth it to take a bit of a risk.'

Lily swallowed hard. 'You have no idea how much I want to.'

'I think I have an idea.'

They were quiet for a moment before Euphemia sighed, patted Lily's knee, and stood.

'Whatever you decide to do, I'm sure it's the right thing. Just — if you do decide not to pursue this thing with James… stick to it. I know it'll be hard, watching him go through this, especially while you still have feelings for him, but if you're going to let him go, you've got to really let go.'

She'd been telling herself this exact thing every day since their conversation on Wednesday night, had thought about it again and again on her walk this morning, but there was something different about hearing it come from James' mum, about hearing her articulate something that Lily had been turning over in her own head. Euphemia seemed to understand that the things Lily was considering were putting far too much pressure on her for her to ever have the kind of relationship that she and James would have wanted.

She understood that this wasn't the right time. These weren't the right circumstances.

And so while it was going to hurt watching him with everyone else and she was going to want to backtrack on her decision, she had to stick by it. She had to plant her feet firmly behind the line and refuse to cross it because the only thing that would come from their relationship —

It wasn't going to be anything good. It couldn't be anything good when every single time she thought about it — when she stopped thinking about the way that James' glasses suited him and the way his shoulders filled out a suit and the way she imagined his fingers would feel against her bare skin and the way he made her laugh and the way he cared about and for her — whenever she stopped thinking about those things, she immediately started thinking about everything that would break if they got together.

And maybe James didn't care about getting sued, but she couldn't lose this job. She _couldn't_. She'd spent too much of her life without a stable source of income and she knew what that meant, living like that, and she couldn't put herself back into a situation like that, not on purpose.

Lily took a slow, deep breath, looked up at Euphemia, and nodded.

* * *

Euphemia left Lily in the garden so she could have a moment to herself.

Lily watched Euphemia gather herself — she straightened her shoulders, smoothed out non-existent lines in her trousers — before she opened the back door and walked back into the house. Everyone must have wandered back into the kitchen, because Lily heard their voices through the door once Euphemia walked back inside.

She couldn't quite tell what they were talking about, but as long as they weren't talking about her, Lily didn't really care.

Their house really was beautiful, the Potters'. She hadn't really appreciated it when she'd first come out here because she was too busy freaking out about what Euphemia was going to talk to her about, but they really did have a lovely garden. The patio was slate, like the drive, there was a small flower bed around the perimeter, and the whole yard smelled like the lilac and whatever else they had growing there.

It would be lovely to sit out here at night. To watch the sun go down over the houses behind theirs.

Lily closed her eyes and took a few deep breaths to try and clear her head.

She went back into the house a few minutes later, after checking her face in her phone camera to make sure that her eyes weren't recognisably red or puffy. If anyone looked closely they might notice, but Lily assumed that, busy and packed as it was, no one inside was going to take time to really look at her face.

She opened the kitchen door quietly, hoping to slip in without being noticed, but James was sitting at the table as she walked in.

She cleared her throat and attempted a smile. 'Hey.'

'Hey. Here.' He grabbed a mug off the table and handed it to her.

Tea.

She was not going to get emotional about a goddamn cup of tea.

'Thanks.' She took a long, slow sip, and focused on the the heat flooding through her, on the way it steadied her nerves.

James nodded before he looked back down at the mug in his own hands. 'No problem.'

They fell silent.

This was awful. This was fucking _awful._ They weren't — it had never been difficult for them to sustain a conversation, and now here they were, the mugs of tea in their hands the only things keeping them (keeping Lily at least) from going totally and completely mad.

How were they supposed to get through the next six weeks if they couldn't even have a civil conversation?

'We got some great footage today,' Lily said.

James was halfway through another long sip of tea and he hummed. 'Yeah.'

'Your Dad and Remus seemed pretty nervous about being on camera.'

James nodded. 'That's not really their kind of thing. Mum and Sirius are more into the spotlight.'

Lily laughed. 'You know, somehow I guessed that.'

She'd hoped that he might finally crack a smile at that, but he looked down the moment she'd started laughing and so whatever smile might have been there would have been completely invisible to her.

They both drank some more tea.

Lily finished her cup and started turning it nervously around in her hands. 'We should head over to the ceremony space soon.'

James nodded and he tipped his head back without catching her eye, finished off the rest of his tea. 'Alright. Just let me go say goodbye to my parents.'

'You'll be back tonight.'

'No, I know, but it'll be really late and — I'll meet you out front, yeah?'

Lily nodded. 'Yeah, alright.'

James got up from the table, walked over and reached his hand out towards her. It took Lily a moment to realise what he wanted.

'Oh. Mug.' She handed it to him and James almost, _almost_ smiled.

He nodded. 'Mug.'

He washed their mugs quickly in the sink and set them on the draining board — when he turned back around, Lily quickly averted her eyes and pretended that she hadn't been watching his arms move as he was washing up.

He looked at her for a second, longer than he had since they'd argued, and the expression on his face — it was like he was trying to decide something and he wasn't quite sure which way he wanted to go.

He finally sighed, said, 'I'll meet you out front,' and then walked out of the kitchen.

When Lily reached back to pull her mobile out of her pocket, her hands were shaking a little bit.

She texted Mary to have her send a car and, after taking one more deep breath, walked through the house and out the front door. She felt a bit bad not saying goodbye to any of James' family, especially Euphemia since she'd been so wonderful to her, but Lily had to remind herself that, really, she wasn't going to be seeing these people ever again and so, ultimately, it didn't really matter that she wasn't saying goodbye.

She walked down the drive and sat on the garden wall.

She heard the front door open a few minutes later, and she resisted the urge to turn around and look. Whoever had opened the door must have hesitated on the step, but it wasn't long before she heard them start walking towards her. She only looked up when she noticed someone moving in her periphery.

'Car should be here in a second.'

James nodded and slid onto the wall next to her.

Again, neither of them seemed to have anything to say.

The next few weeks really were going to be fucking —

'I'm sorry if Mum made you uncomfortable. Out in the garden earlier.'

Lily's head snapped up and she turned to look at him.

'I — I really didn't know she was going to do that,' he continued. 'I didn't ask her to or anything, I —'

'It's okay,' Lily smiled, genuinely smiled. 'It didn't make me uncomfortable. I mean, more than I already sort of am about this whole mess.'

James breathed a laugh and Lily's smile widened at the sound. 'This is a mess isn't it?'

Lily nodded. 'It really is. Anyway, it was nice talking to her. She helped me clear my head a bit.'

James raised an eyebrow at her. 'Oh?'

She thought she saw the faintest trace of hope on his face, just the lightest hint of it across his features.

Lily nodded. 'Every other time I've talked about it, it's turned into some kind of fight. It was nice that she just listened.'

James nodded slowly and looked down at his knees.

'She said I really had to let go. If that's what I wanted.'

James looked back up at her then, and he studied her for a long moment. When he spoke, his voice was low and rough. 'Is that what you want?'

'It's what I'm doing.'

'That doesn't answer my question.'

Lily took a breath. 'I know.'

The car pulled up then, and they both slid off the wall.


	27. Chapter 26

**no mid-week update this week, so I'll see you next Sunday with the next chapter. Enjoyyyy x**

* * *

The ceremony that night was a more subdued affair than perhaps anyone was really expecting or anticipating.

James passed it off, cleverly, as his pre-emptive sadness about leaving Twickenham and his family again, but he'd assured everyone that he would be back to normal once he got into the Spanish sun next week.

He sent Hannah and Anja home, and Anja's tears on her departure were, probably, the first really genuine tears they'd had on the show.

James had looked absolutely heartbroken when they'd said goodbye.

Because it took James a while to get the energy that Jax was looking for, the shoot took a lot longer than Lily had hoped. It was just before dawn by the time they were finally finished and she was shutting James into a car that was going to take him back to his parents' place.

Marlene met her out in front while she watched James' car pull away, and Lily jumped when she wrapped an arm around her waist.

'How're you feeling?'

Lily sighed. 'Fucking exhausted.'

Marlene laughed and they turned, started walking back into the hotel. 'Besides that.'

'I'm alright. We just need time to get back to normal, you know?'

Marlene nodded. 'Yeah, I know.'

Their flight was due to leave a little after two that afternoon, so Lily didn't get much sleep that morning, especially once the sun was fully up and she only had her mostly-decorative hotel curtains and her extra pillow to block out the light.

James didn't look any better off when she got to his house at half eleven, though he did have a bit of a smile on his face when he got into the car with a folded napkin in his hands.

'Here.' He held the napkin out towards her so it fell open and Lily gasped. He was holding a pair of the most delicious looking chocolate eclairs Lily had ever seen in her life.

'Where did you get these?!'

'Remus made them. He stress bakes. They've got espresso cream filling.'

'Oh my god. Tell Remus I love him.'

James raised an eyebrow at her. 'I can't. You took my phone.'

Lily rolled her eyes, but felt the warmth spreading through her chest at the familiar argument. 'Well, what's his number, then, I'll text him.'

James snorted. 'I don't have his fucking number memorised. I barely know my parents' numbers.'

Lily sighed. 'What's his email, then? Do you know that?'

James rattled it off and Lily typed him out a quick email that was mostly _these are the best fucking eclairs I've ever had I'm sorry you were stressed but oh my god you're a genius._

The eclairs seemed to have uncorked some of the tension between them because the ride to the airport was some of the easiest time they'd had together all week.

Maybe it was the pastry, maybe it was the fact that they were flying somewhere warm and sunny and not England… whatever it was, Lily was grateful for it. Being able to talk to James again, to talk to him like they were friends… it was all she'd wanted since she'd left his house on Wednesday night.

They were still going strong a few hours later when Benjy arrived with the car in Barcelona. He was blasting that Ed Sheeran song when the car pulled up, and it took everything Lily had not to strangle him.

'I thought this would be appropriate!' he shouted over the music in response to Lily's glare when she settled into the back seat.

Lily didn't feel very much like shouting, so she held her fingers up at him and pulled her mobile out of her pocket.

They were staying in a large house in Gracia, a neighbourhood that Mary thought had a nice blend of modern design and historical charm. Lily hadn't known anything about Spain, still didn't, but she figured that it would be fine as long as the house was big enough to host the ceremony and they didn't have to rent out a filming space like they had back in London.

It amazed her how quickly the scene outside the car changed, how it went from the airport, to some wide open, dark green fields, to the city, with houses crammed together along packed, trafficky streets. It happened so quickly that she might have missed it if she hadn't been looking out the window.

James and Benjy were still laughing and singing that goddamn song when they went through the roundabout and started north through the city, and it took all of Lily's energy not to open the car door and push them out.

The buildings got taller and more densely packed the further they drove into the city. There were palm trees lining the centre of road — for some reason Lily hadn't expected to see them there — crowds of people streaming in either direction on the pavement. She wasn't even out of the car yet, but there was something about the energy of this place that she was really attracted to, something that started her blood racing.

Benjy finally consented to turn off Ed Sheeran when they turned down the small, one-lane street that would drop them off at James' house for the week — whether it was because they were almost there or because Lily had just finished threatening him within an inch of his life if he didn't turn that fucking song _off_ she wasn't sure. She liked to imagine it was the latter.

The house looked smaller than Lily'd imagined it would be, though, as the car pulled to a stop out front, she realised that it was fairly long, and slightly yellowed with age. The wooden door, tall and narrow, was set into the house by a few inches and there were bright blue rails in front of the windows on the either side of the door. It was warmer than Lily expected it would be when she climbed out of the car, easily a balmy twenty-seven, and she was only standing outside for a few minutes while she rummaged around in her bag for the house key, but she already had a thin sheen of sweat across her forehead.

It took her a moment to get the door unlocked — the bloody lock was a bit stuck and wouldn't turn unless she jiggled the key just right. There was a long, narrow hallway running down the centre of the house, and if she looked, Lily could see where the rooms on either side opened up to large, open spaces towards the back of the house. There was a small sitting room just to the right of the entry that led into a wider space that had been cleared of most of the furniture (Lily could already see some of the lights hanging from the ceiling), and there was a narrow staircase on the left that led up to the second floor.

'First door on the right Peter claimed for Production,' Benjy said as he shut the front door behind him. 'You're second on the left, James.'

James nodded, grabbed his bag, and started up the stairs.

Lily didn't move to follow him and Benjy raised an eyebrow at her. 'You aren't going, too?'

She shook her head. 'No reason to. And anyway, I need to talk to you about getting his first Barcelona diary since _someone_ decided to have an impromptu Ed Sheeran concert on the way here.'

Benjy laughed. 'Oh, you didn't enjoy that?'

'What gave me away?'

Benjy snorted and Lily rolled her eyes. ' _Anyway._ I thought it might be nice to set up on the balcony here, get Barcelona in the background. This place has a decent view if I'm remembering this listing correctly.'

Benjy nodded. 'That sounds good. It'll be a nice change of pace from what we've been doing in the car anyway.'

'Exactly.'

The large upper balcony was off of James' room, so they gave him a few minutes to unpack while Benjy set up his camera equipment outside. Lily dragged a few chairs up from various spots throughout the house — a stool from the patio in the tiny back garden, a chair from the kitchen — so they had some height options. It took them a little while, a little over an hour, but when they finally settled on the tall outdoor stool and got the angle just right, Lily could tell that it was going to be a beautiful set of shots.

James sat down in the stool and smiled as the sun hit his skin. He closed his eyes and tipped his head back, breathing deep, his smile growing wider all the time. When he looked back up at them, he looked incredibly relaxed and deeply happy.

'God, I've missed the sun.'

'I wouldn't think you get enough of it to miss, back home,' Lily said, leaning up against the railing behind the camera.

James laughed. 'This show is spoiling me, I think.'

They chatted easily for the better part of an hour — Lily asked him about the dates he had planned for that week, the women he'd be going on those dates with, him impressions of Barcelona so far — before Benjy dismissed them so that he could get some framing shots and Lily carried the chairs back inside.

James was sitting on his bed smiling to himself when Lily walked back into his room and set the chair up against the wall near the door. Lily quirked an eyebrow at him, took note of the fact that his micpack was sitting, off, next to him on the bed.

'What's up?'

James shook his head as he looked up at her. 'Nothing. I'm just really happy to be here. The sun is nice after… well,' he cleared his throat and dipped his head sheepishly before he looked back up at her. 'It's nice to be here after the last two weeks were what they were.'

Lily felt her cheeks heat, but she was determined to keep it together. She nodded slowly, took a few steps closer to the bed. 'Yeah. I know what you mean.'

They looked at each other for a minute, neither of them speaking, before James cleared his throat and smiled. 'Anyway. We're gonna be fine. We're moving on.'

Lily nodded, moved a bit closer. 'We're moving on.'

Maybe she was imagining the way that his eyes darkened as he looked at her then.

She was imagining it.

'So, if you have a minute,' she was pleased to note that her voice sounded light, normal, 'we could go over your date list for this week? We've got a two, a three, and a group.'

James laughed, 'I have literally nothing else to do, Evans. Of course I have a minute.' He scooted over, and patted the space next to him on the bed, and, after a moment's hesitation, Lily crossed the room and sat down beside him.

* * *

The next few days passed, largely, without incident.

She and James got on easily, the group date on Monday had gone spectacularly well (a friendly football match in the park that could've turned into the James and Liza show but, somehow, managed to stay balanced), and James was anxious about, but not resistant to, the dance lessons they were going to for his two on one date Tuesday afternoon.

It was all going so well, in fact, that Lily couldn't quite remember why she'd been so anxious about having to get on with James for the rest of their time on the show. They were barely a few days out from the most awkward conversation of their lives, and they were already kind of back to normal. He was being cheeky, he was teasing her again — maybe it was flirting, but they'd always been like that, so she didn't think too much of it.

And anyway, it was how everyone was used to seeing them together. It would have been weirder if they _weren't_ acting like that.

In retrospect, she really should have known that it was all too good to be true.

The two on one was a set of couples dance lessons with Zoe, a yoga instructor from Brighton that James hadn't really spent much time with yet, and Laura — one of the women were scheduled to go home at the end of the date, and James was almost beside himself with happiness the entire drive to the dance studio.

'I know that it's shitty of me to be this excited about sending someone home, but _Evans._ I am so glad to be shot of her.'

Lily laughed and patted his knee. 'Well, you aren't shot of her yet. You still have to get through the next few hours.'

James waved her off. 'Please. This'll be nothing. I'm just going to keep imagining her walking out the door to get me through.'

James did seem to have a much easier time behaving himself on this date than Lily had expected he would. The instructor started them out individually, just lined them up and had them practise their steps to the beat, before she started to pair them off. They set it up so that the contestant not currently dancing had to sit against the far wall and watch, a camera trained on her face the entire time, and Lily had a hard time biting back a laugh as she watched the flurry of angry expressions on Laura's face while James and Zoe danced. He was a bit stiffer when it'd come time to dance with Laura, but he refrained from pulling a Sirius and dumping jelly on her head and so Lily counted it as a victory.

They had formal lessons for two hours, counting breaks and re-shoots, and Lily watched as James got increasingly nervous as they neared the end of the date and the time when he would have to send someone (Laura) home.

She wasn't sure why he was nervous. He'd literally been waiting _weeks_ to do this. He'd been bloody beside himself in the car.

James touched Zoe lightly on the elbow when the instructor left at the end of class, pulled her away from where Laura was standing over near the water station.

Two cameras followed. Lily held her breath.

'Zoe,' he said as they came to a stop by the far wall near the mirrors, 'I had a great time with you today, but I'm afraid that I can't ask you to stay another week.'

 _What._

Zoe looked as shocked as Lily felt. She couldn't believe, after all his bitching and moaning about Laura, that he was really going to keep her on when he finally had the chance to get rid of her.

Laura stood off to the side looking incredibly smug as James and Zoe talked, her smile getting wider when Zoe reached up and brushed a tear off her cheek before she nodded and started towards the door at the back of the studio.

James stood there for a moment and watched Zoe go. When he turned, his eyes caught Lily's for the briefest of moments. She tried to ask him what the fuck he was doing, why he'd kept Laura on after he'd spent five weeks complaining about her. She wanted to know why he'd chosen to send Zoe home in tears and leave Laura around until the ceremony, but then she noticed the ghost of a smirk on his lips, he sent her a subtle wink, and he started walking across the studio towards Laura.

And Lily knew then that something was about to go down.

She didn't know what, but she was pretty sure that she was going to want to kill him when it was all over.

The cameras had pulled in as James approached Laura, sure that there were about to get some kind of heartfelt speech, maybe — _finally_ — a kiss, but then James started talking and it was clear that they weren't going to get anything of the sort.

'What are you looking so smug about?'

Laura stepped forward and ran her hands up James' forearms. 'You've just sent Zoe home.'

She stepped into him. James shook her off and stepped back.

'Laura, I'm going to have to ask you to leave as well.'

'But, James,' Laura laughed, but it was clear from the tone that she was absolutely livid. 'You've already sent Zoe home. You can't send _both_ of us home.'

James crossed his arms. 'Unfortunately for you, I can do just that.'

'But —' She took a moment to gather herself, but Lily could see that she was finding it increasingly difficult to remain civil. 'Why would you get rid of me? I'm the best woman here.'

James looked up almost reflexively at Lily before he met Laura's gaze again. 'You've been nothing but terrible since you got here — you've made everyone's lives complete hell.'

' _James_ —'

James shook his head. 'I don't want to be rude, Laura. Really I don't. Mostly because my mother raised me to be respectful and she would _literally_ kill me if I said things the way I want to say them. But I need to be honest.

'You've been absolutely horrible the entire time you've been here. You've tried to sabotage other contestants to make yourself look better. You almost broke Rachel's nose that week —'

Laura scoffed dismissively. 'Rachel tripped over the end of the paddling pool. Everyone saw that.'

James held up his hands. ' _Laura._ I've had enough. I can't have someone here that thinks it's acceptable to treat other people like that. I can't be with someone who fucking talks about people the way that you do. You've got to go.'

'You kept me on this long!'

'They made me!' James jerked his head towards the cameras and Jax shouted, 'Oi! Re-shoot that!'

James whipped around. 'What am I supposed to say?'

'Maybe you didn't know that she was this bad?' Jax suggested. Laura crossed her arms and huffed angrily.

No one paid her any mind.

James rolled his eyes, breathed a heavy sigh. 'Fine, whatever. Let's just get this over with, shall we?'

He turned back to Laura, waited a moment for the cameras to reset and started again. 'It took me a while to realise just how toxic you really are. So much of what you did happened when I wasn't around and I needed to wait and see it for myself because I believe in giving people the benefit of the doubt.'

He paused before he turned and looked at Jax. 'Better?'

Jax nodded. 'Yes. Now stop fucking up my scene, Potter. Wrap it up.'

James flashed him a grin. 'Right-o, Jax. Sorry.' He turned back to Laura and his features immediately shifted into a frown.

'Best of luck, Laura. I really hope that you learn how to be a better person moving forward.'

Laura had, for once, been rendered completely speechless. She frowned at him for a long moment before she shook her head at him, muttered, 'You'll be sorry you let go of me, James Potter,' before she turned on her heel and stormed out of the dance studio.

As happy as she was that Laura was finally gone, overwhelmingly, Lily was focused on the fact that James had, without consulting her, completely fucked up their schedule for the week. She'd managed to put on something of a straight face, had kept it together while James had filmed his diary, but when they stepped outside the dance studio, she was _this close_ to killing him and being done with it.

As it was, she walked over to where James was gabbing away with some of the other crew (who somehow weren't absolutely livid with him, who were standing there smiling and laughing like everything was okay when everything most _certainly_ was not okay and definitely wouldn't be once Pettigrew found out what happened), grabbed his elbow mid-sentence, and dragged him towards the door in a silence that, if James had bothered to stop laughing for two bloody seconds, he would have realised contained a death sentence. Lily saw Benjy turn (as quickly as the fucking steadicam would allow) and start to follow them, but Lily just shouted, 'Don't bother, Fen,' and walked through the door onto the pavement.

James was still laughing in her ear, something about, 'What's going on, Evans?' but Lily was still too focused on breathing, on trying not to kill him, that she could only reply to Benjy when he said, 'Lily, you know I've got to be here for this bit, too.'

Their car was waiting on the pavement outside the dance studio,and she opened the back door, pointed inside and said, 'In,' through clenched teeth. Benjy cringed at her tone, but James just laughed, 'You could ask nicely, Ev — '

'In,' her voice was louder this time. and James, to his credit, just held up his hands in surrender and climbed into the back of the limo. Benjy made like he was going to climb in after James, and Lily shook her head.

'Lil,' Benjy's tone was tentative, like he knew she was on the verge of exploding and wanted to say his piece without her going off at him, 'you know I have to. I wouldn't insist if — '

Lily shook her head, 'No, I know,' she said, trying to keep her voice even, 'but I'm about to swear my bloody head off at him and you won't be able to use the footage anyway. Just —,' she felt the anger boiling hotter in her stomach and she threw up her hands. 'Can we have a minute of peace? I really, really don't need all of the things I'm about to scream at him on tape.'

Benjy bit the corner of his lip and studied her for a moment before he sighed. 'I really don't know, Lily.'

She could feel her fuse growing shorter the longer she stood there and she really didn't want to go off on Benjy because it wasn't his bloody fault that James was a moron — a stupid, keeping-all-his-plans-to-his-damn-self prat — and so she proposed the first thing she could think of.

'I'll tell Pettigrew you were there if he asks, that I swore too much and we knew you couldn't use the footage, so I just told you to destroy it so it didn't leak. If it comes down to it, I'll take the heat, Fen, I swear it.'

Benjy took one long, deep breath, and, after a moment, nodded.

Lily could've hugged him — livid as she was, though, she settled for a quick thank you before throwing herself into the back of the limo and pulling the door shut hard behind her.

James watched her as she settled into the seat next to him, wide grin still plastered on his face. His eyes were slightly wider than they usually were when he smiled genuinely and there was the smallest wrinkle in his brow that told Lily he was finally having the decency to at least be a bit nervous about what was about to unfold, especially now that Lily had closed the door and left Benjy on the pavement.

She dropped her bag heavily onto the ground at her feet, folded her hands neatly in her lap (more so she didn't smack him than an attempt to create an outward appearance of civility), and leaned forward a bit, her eyes blazing. 'What the _fuck_ is wrong with you?'

James' hand jumped to his hair, but he cleared his throat, tried to smile, and she almost had to give it to him — hand in the hair aside, he looked completely calm.

'Well,' he leaned back in his seat and shot her a cheeky grin, 'a lot of things, I expect.'

She really didn't have the time (or the words) to explain to him that now was _not_ the time for him to try and charm his way out of being in trouble. She gritted her teeth, pulled in a sharp breath. 'You — you realise what you've done, correct?'

'I'd certainly hope so,' James said, 'otherwise, you might want to take me to — '

'James,' she snapped, and James fell silent, 'now is _not_ the time for you to try and charm me into not being livid with you!'

'I think it's _always_ time to charm you, love.'

'James!'

'What?' His voice got just a touch louder, a tad more impatient. 'What is the problem, Lily?'

'I want you to admit that you're a fucking idiot!'

'For what?' James was almost matching her in volume now.

'You weren't supposed to eliminate two people today,' she snapped. 'These dates are a single elimination; they always have been!'

'Well, people won't be expecting the double elimination then, will they?' James said, raising an eyebrow. 'I've just done you a favour, haven't I?'

'How in the _fuck_ have you done me a favour?'

'I'm pretty sure you're going to get some really dramatic shots out of this episode — isn't that what you're after? The _drama_?'

Lily scoffed. 'You're a bastard.'

James raised his eyebrows. 'Am I? Tell me I'm fucking wrong, then.'

She couldn't, he knew it, and that irritated the fuck out of her.

She threw her hands up. 'You have to clear things like this with me! You can't just go around doing whatever the fuck you want!'

'Isn't the whole point of this supposed to be that _I_ find somebody? Don't you think that it would make sense if I'm the one figuring out who stays and who goes?'

'James, for fucks sake, you signed a contract — '

James groaned. 'If I have to hear about that contract one more fucking time!'

'Oh, I'm sorry,' Lily's voice hardened, became intensely sarcastic, and she couldn't help but be satisfied at the outraged expression on James' face. 'I forgot we fucking made you sign this. I FUCKING FORGOT that I took your fucking hand and signed this fucking thing against your will. Oh poor fucking baby.' She knew it was absurd to be this angry with him, knew that she was blowing it completely out of proportion, but knowing it didn't stop the anger seething in her chest.

'Jesus christ, Lily,' he finally _sounded_ angry, but he was still obviously restraining himself and that, if anything, just made her angrier. 'I'm not saying you fucking forced me, I'm just saying that — '

'Then stop your bloody whinging about it! You signed the damn thing!'

'I never would've if I'd known that you were going to hold it over my head until the end of time.'

Lily rolled her eyes. 'No one held your hand and forced you, James, stop being so fucking dramatic.'

'I just thought,' James was still hovering just on the verge of shouting, and she didn't know how he'd managed to stay so calm, 'that I'd get to choose the women that I have to fucking date on this programme. Isn't that the point of this?'

'Yes, but — James, you have to _clear_ shit like this with me! We need to talk about it first! I need to take this to Marlene and Peter and clear everything through the rest of production! This isn't just you making decisions off the cuff and we fucking roll with it every week. There's _planning_ involved!'

'Evans, come on,' James dropped his voice, leaned towards her a bit in the seat. 'You know I don't like Zoe or Laura. You _know_ I don't.'

'You don't seem to fucking like _anyone_ ,' Lily snapped, and she knew as soon as she said it that she was weaving them back towards territory she'd thought they'd long since left.'You can't just go round getting rid of people left, right, and bloody centre!'

'What am I supposed to do, then, keep them for appearances?'

'Just this one time!'

' _One time_?!' That, finally, managed to snap something in him. 'Do you not remember the last five weeks? I kept a literal _monster_ on this show because you made me.'

'But Zoe isn't a monster! Why couldn't you have at least kept her on until the elimination this week?'

'Because I'm not doing that anymore! I feel bad enough about —' He raked a frustrated hand through his hair. 'I'm not fucking doing that, Evans, I'm _not._ I've finally reached the point in this show where you all can't really tell me what to do anymore, and god fucking damn it, I'm going to do what I think is right.'

Lily groaned angrily. 'Why in the _fuck_ can't you just fucking behave?!'

She expected him to shout back, to throw his hands up, run one through his hair in exasperation — she expected him to get louder because he was always meeting her where she was, matching her, but instead he took a deep breath, leaned a bit closer, ran his tongue along his bottom lip.

'You know why I can't do that, Evans.'

His voice was quieter, lower, rougher, and she was sure she was sitting there just gaping at him, but _fuck_ if it didn't sound good when his voice was like that, like he —

'Don't you?'

She should have taken a moment, should have leaned back, restored the distance they'd both gradually closed between them as they'd been shouting, should have taken a breath, forced herself to fucking _think_ because they'd talked about this and they'd made a decision about this _,_ but she didn't do any of those things, because instead of doing the logical thing, the smart thing, she leant forward and kissed him.

It was a mistake, a huge, colossal mistake, but only because the moment her lips found his, she could no longer keep telling herself that this wasn't what she wanted, that this, right here, wasn't worth whatever hellfire might rain down on them. It wasn't even that much — just the pressure of her lips against his — but the thrill in her veins, the deep satisfaction that settled in her stomach —

She pulled back almost immediately, the frantic apology already on her lips, but James' hand was on her cheek, and he was bringing her back to him, meeting her in the middle, and once his mouth was on hers again, she had absolutely no intention of stopping.

He moaned softly when their lips met, a sound that was more a rumbling in his chest than anything else, and his fingers threaded through her hair as he pulled her closer. His lips moved gently against hers at first, slowly, like he was intent on savouring this moment, but the anger from a few minutes before was still burning hot in Lily's gut and his slow pace wasn't compatible with the adrenaline spiked in her veins. She ran her tongue along his bottom lip, coaxed his mouth open, pulled back and pressed soft, teasing kisses to the corner of his mouth and along his jaw, but every time his lips found hers again, he maintained that soft, steady pace that was slowly driving her mad. She could tell that they were reaching the limits of his self-control, could tell from the way his hand tightened on her hip as she grazed her teeth against his neck, could tell from the initial increase in urgency each time their lips met again. He settled back into his rhythm every time, but they were teetering on a knife point and the realisation settled hot and heavy in her gut.

There would be time to savour these moments — this was not one of them.

She drew his bottom lip lightly between her teeth and his control finally snapped.

They became a mess of hands, both of them trying to touch as much of the other as possible — her hands ran across his chest, his arms, through the hair at the base of his neck, and she would have sworn that he'd run his hands over every available inch of her. Eventually he realised that brushing his fingertips along the side of breast, just lightly enough to make her arch into him, turned her into putty into his hands, and it wasn't long before her hands were underneath his shirt and teasing the button of his trousers.

She couldn't get close enough, she needed to feel him pressed against her, and she shifted, let James move his mouth to her neck as she hitched one of her legs across him and settled herself on his lap. He groaned against her skin as their hips knocked together and she grabbed his jaw, pulled his mouth back to hers. James' hands found her thighs, his fingers slipping just underneath the hem of her shorts, and Lily moaned against his lips. His hand slid up underneath the fabric and she felt the tip of one of his fingers against the edge of her pants. She broke the kiss as she sucked in a sharp breath and James opened his eyes.

The warm, molten amber was almost entirely subsumed by the black of his pupils, and the look of him — he was breathing hard and his hair was a disaster and his glasses were slightly off kilter and he was looking at her like he had seen her down to her very skin.

James slipped his fingers a bit further up her shorts, and Lily groaned as she leant forward to kiss him again.

Then there were a few solid, rapid knocks on the dividing screen, and Lily jumped back, nearly falling off of James' lap in the process.

'Fuck,' she scrambled off of James, ignored his hands as they tried to pull at her waist, to settle her back on top of him. 'Fuck, we're here.'

She ran her hands quickly through her hair, tried to regain some semblance of composure, and before she even thought to ask James if he was ready, before she even really looked at him, she shouted, 'Thanks,' to the driver and opened the door onto the pavement.


	28. Chapter 27

**happy Sunday! x**

 **There will be a chapter tomorrow _and_ Wednesday this week. Why I do this to myself, I'll never know**

 **But anyway - enjoy!**

* * *

Now she was the one avoiding him.

She felt like such a collosal arsehole for it, especially because she remembered how much she'd hated it when he was the one avoiding her just a few days ago, but she couldn't help it. She just couldn't stop thinking about the way his hands had felt in her hair, the way his fingers had slipped up underneath of her shorts….

More than once she caught herself wishing she was the type that wore skirts on shoots.

She needed to talk to him, she knew that, because this was a seismic shift in their relationship (or whatever they were calling it these days) and they couldn't just let this go by unaddressed, but a larger part of her just wanted to ignore it and pretend it never happened.

The largest part of her wanted to keep doing it over and over again, no questions asked, job and contract and media attacks and everything else be damned.

Especially because she kept catching him looking at her on the date at Las Ramblas the next afternoon, looking at her like he knew what her body felt like underneath his hands. Like he could still feel the weight of her curves against his palms.

She nearly had a stroke when they dipped into that chocolate shop and James looked her dead in the eye as he sucked a bit of chocolate off his thumb.

When Benjy asked why she was so red, Lily just told him she'd forgotten to re—apply her suncream.

It had been easy to avoid James on the date, when they were dipping in and out of shops all afternoon and the streets were crowded and she had to stay behind the camera. It had been a bit harder when they were sitting alone with Benjy in the car, when she sometimes felt herself looking at him and thinking about the last time they'd been in the back of a car together… but she was grateful for the fact that James didn't know how much Benjy knew about them and their… thing.

It meant that she could keep the conversation professional whenever Benjy was around — and he was almost always around — and so she could quietly freak out about everything that had gone on without her actually having to talk to James (or act the way that she was thinking about acting, which, depending on the day, varied from packing up everything in her room and running away to snogging him in front of the entire crew to just put them out of their misery already).

No matter how much she was able to hide it from James, she could feel the anxiety and tension building in her gut as the days passed. She knew that there was going to come a time when she was going to have to seriously confront the fact that they had just — that they'd completely —

They'd gone against everything that they'd been trying to do for themselves. They'd been alright, hadn't they, had been building space between them and had been trying to find some way to get through the rest of this show without everything getting catastrophically bad. She'd promised Euphemia, she'd _promised,_ and then, just a few days later, she'd gone and bloody thrown herself on him in the back of a car.

She was an idiot. A fucking idiot.

Both because she now couldn't stop thinking about kissing him — that low rumble in his chest whenever she kissed his neck and the way that he'd taken his time with her, his hands moving slowly over her skin like he was trying to commit her to memory — and she knew that she was going to have to tell him that it couldn't happen again.

And god, she really, _really_ didn't want to have to tell him that. Because he was looking at her again, because he was smiling and laughing with her, because things felt like they had before — almost — and she wasn't ready to give that up. But she knew that it wasn't fair.

He was only looking at her like that because he didn't know what she was obsessing over in the back of her mind.

Still, they managed to make it through the ceremony that week without having _the conversation._ She'd gone up to James' room the minute she arrived at the house around five that evening, and though she was careful to leave the door open and stand as far away from him as possible without looking awkward, it didn't stop him from looking at her like he was thinking about doing absolutely unspeakable things to her.

And, even though she knew how this was going to end, it didn't stop her wanting to ask him what he was thinking about. To ask him to describe it to her in that soft, gravelly voice. To ask him for every insignificant little detail.

It seemed a bit silly to be having an elimination that week, especially now that James was only sending one woman home after his impromptu double elimination a few days before, but they had to abide by the rules all the same (a thought that seemed doubly significant to her now).

Still, it seemed unnecessarily harsh when Olivia was the only one packing her bags at the end of the night.

Lily had found James' decision to eliminate her a bit of surprise, truth be told. She'd thought that they got on — she could remember them talking quite a bit earlier in the show — but James had just shrugged and said that his relationships with the other women had grown over the course of the show, but that his time with Olivia hadn't changed much.

'There isn't a lot of time on this show,' he said. 'I don't want to keep someone around if I don't think we're growing towards anything.'

Lily wanted to ask him if he was serious about that, the fact that his relationships had grown with the others, but she decided that it would be best to just keep her jealous mouth shut and let him film his fucking diary.

Because the ceremony was fairly short, Lily managed to actually get in before sunrise, something that hadn't happened to her _once_ in the last series. She decided to take advantage of her early night (and her hotel's much, much sturdier curtains) and have a bit of a lie in the next morning.

She woke the next morning — early afternoon — to her mobile buzzing angrily on her bedside table. She groped blindly for the phone, nearly dropped it onto her face when she tried to press her thumb to the home button, and opened up her messages.

 _Marlene McKinnon: you over there? Or can I come down? I'm bored._

Lily tapped out a quick reply ( _I'm at the hotel — give me fifteen so I can shower then come on down_ ) and pushed herself up out of bed and shuffled off to the shower.

Marlene, true to form, arrived exactly fifteen minutes after Lily had hit send.

She'd just finished blow drying her hair when she heard a knock on the door, and she padded out of the bathroom to let Marlene in.

'Hey,' Marlene smiled at her as she shut the door. 'I like your top.'

Lily looked down at the navy blue tank top she was wearing before she smiled at Marlene. 'Thanks. It's from Mango.'

'Really?'

'Mhmm. I got it last year, I think.'

Lily walked back into the bathroom, Marlene behind her, and plugged her flat iron in.

'I can't believe you're still here,' Marlene said, leaning up against the wall. 'You're normally over at James' so early.'

Lily nodded, half shrugged. 'Yeah, but — I needed a bit of a lie in today. I expect James did, too.'

'Still, this is _so_ not like you. You better watch out, we're going to think you're neglecting your duties.'

Lily stuck her tongue out at Marlene in the mirror and checked the heat on her flat iron before she sectioned off her hair and started straightening.

She'd been thinking over the past few days, and now that she and Marlene were alone, she didn't know if there would be a better time…. Part of her really wanted to tell Marlene what had happened — she knew that it was foolish to talk about it, knew that it was smarter to keep everything as close to her chest as possible because it minimised the risk of people finding out, but she also couldn't stop thinking about how relieved she'd felt when Euphemia had talked to her last week, how she had felt the stress and tension and anxiety flood out of her because for _once_ she'd been able to talk freely about it. And Marlene — Marlene was her best friend. And yes, things were complicated when they were on the show together becauseMarlene had very conflicting roles to play and _yes_ , Lily felt bad about asking Marlene to juggle this in addition to everything that she was already juggling just to maintain some sense of normalcy in their friendship when Marlene was technically Lily's boss, but it was getting harder and harder for Lily to keep this to herself, especially now that she'd had an outlet.

And it wasn't like she was letting Marlene in on something completely new. Marlene didn't know _all_ the ins and outs of what had happened recently — they hadn't talked about it since yoga back in London — but she knew that there was something between them. She knew that this was something Lily was struggling with.

And Lily couldn't keep carrying this around on her conscience, not without someone else to help her carry it.

It was weighing so heavily on her. Maybe it wouldn't have been if it had just been a one-off, something that she wasn't thinking about doing again, but there was no doubt in her mind that she wanted to do it again.

It was all she'd thought about since it happened. And when she wasn't thinking about their actual kiss, she was imagining what it could have been like if they'd been in his room, alone, uninterrupted.

It was going to take a lot of energy to keep from acting on every fantasy she'd whipped up in her head over the last forty-eight hours.

And so, when Lily was nearly done flat ironing her hair and Marlene was pacing back and forth behind her in the mirror because she could _never fucking sit still,_ she blurted it out before she could talk herself out of it.

'I kissed James.'

Marlene froze, turned, and her eyes found Lily's in the mirror. 'What?'

'Or he kissed me, we kissed, I don't know. It doesn't matter, I guess.' Her hands were trembling and she gripped the straightener tighter as she grabbed the next section of her hair.

Marlene ignored her rambling. 'When did this happen?!'

Lily ran the flat iron through the front pieces of her hair again, frowned at her reflection before her eyes met Marlene's. 'In the car on the way back to the house from the two on one,' Lily said, pulling her eyes from Marlene's to focus on her hair again. 'I was shouting at him about being a fucking idiot, and — well, I don't know.'

'You kissed him.'

Marlene's expression was completely even, and Lily couldn't tell whether Marlene was going to strangle her for being an idiot or congratulate her on finally making a move.

'Yeah,' Lily finished the last few pieces of her hair and turned the flat iron off. 'I kissed him.'

They stood there quietly for a few moments while Lily wrapped up her flat iron, gathered the things on the counter, and started shoving them into her bag. When she'd finished, Lily turned to face Marlene and leaned up against the counter.

'Are you going to kill me?'

Marlene shook her head. 'Though I can't decide if I want to hug you or tell you you're a moron, honestly.'

Lily breathed a tense laugh. 'A bit a both, I reckon.'

Marlene sighed, and her eyes went unfocused for a second as she bit her lip, tried to think of a response. Her eyes snapped back to Lily's after a few moments and she sucked in a deep breath.

'Welp,' she said, 'not much we can do about it now. What's your plan?'

Lily raised her eyebrows. 'Plan?'

Marlene nodded. 'What are you going to do about it? We both know you weren't just snogging to release a bit of tension.' Lily held up her hand and groaned, and Marlene just grinned. 'I'm just saying. We're going to need to have a conversation. I know this is the last thing you want to talk to Peter about, but —'

'No,' Lily grabbed her things, pushed off the countertop and walked past Marlene, back out into her hotel room. 'We are not having a "conversation" about anything. We've been over this.'

'We went over this before you started snogging him in the back of town cars.'

'You're saying that like I've made this a habit.'

'Aren't you planning on making this a habit?'

Lily didn't turn around, just started tucking her bathroom things back into her holdall. 'No. It was one time and it was a mistake.'

'Yeah, alright,' Marlene sat down on Lily's bed so that Lily would have to look at her. 'If this is nothing, I'll eat my hat.'

'You don't wear a hat.'

Marlene rolled her eyes. 'Oh you prat, you know what I mean.'

Lily grinned. 'I'm holding you to that. And it won't be a cake, either, so don't get your hopes up.'

'Somehow, I'm not too worried.'

Lily smacked her knee. 'I'm serious. It's _nothing._ '

Marlene raised an eyebrow. 'But do you _want_ to it be nothing?'

Lily shrugged, made a noncommittal noise, and zipped up her bag.

Marlene stared at her, and though Lily was doing her best to avoid looking at her, she could still feel Marlene's eyes on her.

'You can't just avoid answering questions you don't want to answer,' Marlene said, leaning back onto her elbows. 'I'll get it out of you eventually.'

'I don't know what you're talking about,' Lily said. She grabbed her bag, slid it off the bed, and hooked it up onto her shoulder as she turned to start walking back through the room and (hopefully) out into the corridor, but Marlene was quick.

Marlene grabbed her wrist. 'Lily.'

Lily stopped, turned her head to look at her. 'Marlene.'

Marlene sighed. 'God, you're annoying when you've dug your heels in. Just fucking answer the question and we can be done with this.'

Lily turned more fully. 'Done with what?'

'Oh, for fucks' sake. Why did you bother telling me if you weren't actually going to talk to me about it? What was the bloody point?'

"I just — I — _fuck_ , Marlene, I just needed to talk about it. Get it off my chest. I didn't need to start coming up with _plans._ '

'You needed someone to tell you that this is okay.'

'This definitely _isn't_ okay — '

Marlene held up her hand. 'Whatever. I'm not interested in your whiney "what I'm doing is so wrong" spiel right now, Lily.'

Lily shouted, 'I'm not whiney,' but Marlene just kept talking over her. 'I want to know what you're going to do about this.'

They both fell silent, Lily secretly hoping that Marlene was just going to let her drop it, but the look on Marlene's face told her that dropping it was absolutely out of the question.

Lily sighed, dropped her bag onto the floor, turned and sat on the bed next to Marlene, pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes when Marlene finally let go of her wrist.

'I just — ' Lily sighed again, lowered her hands and looked at Marlene. 'This isn't right, you _know_ that it isn't.'

'Alright,' Marlene said, and Lily could tell that she was being careful not to give her opinion one way or the other, 'but that's not what we're talking about right now. Right now, we're talking about what _you_ want. We can deal with the rest later.'

Lily closed her eyes, pressed her fingers into her forehead and started smoothing out the creases there. She — why had she brought this up? _Why_?

Of course she wanted to talk about what she wanted, of course she wanted to think about this like she had options, but she'd been there done that with this conversation and now, because she was a fucking _idiot,_ she'd gone and gotten herself into a situation where she had to deal with this all fucking over again and she couldn't — she could not believe she'd been this stupid.

She pulled in a sharp breath, sat up a little straighter, wiped away the few tears that had escaped. 'It doesn't matter what I want, Mar,' she said, 'it's not going to happen again. I have to go get James. I'll see you in Iceland.'

Lily stood up, grabbed her holdall from the ground, and turned to walk out of the room.

This time, Marlene let her go.

She needed to go find James, make sure he was packed and all that nonsense, but she wasn't sure that she could stand to look him in the eye feeling the way that she did just then. She pulled her mobile out of her back pocket as she walked through the corridor towards the lifts, shot off a quick text to Mary and asked her to _please pop in on James and make sure he's ready — I've got to double check something and can't be up there for a bit x_

Mary, as usual, was more than happy to comply without asking any questions.

And thank god, because Lily needed to dip into the cafe across the street from her hotel and get a bit of that orange and almond empanada that had been calling her name since they'd gotten to Barcelona.

She didn't have long (she _did_ have a flight to catch in a few hours), but she had just enough time for a coffee and god dammit, she was going to take that time because she needed to get herself together before she was alone with James again.

She thanked her waiter in her embarrassingly rudimentary Spanish when he dropped off her order (he just smiled and said 'You're welcome, miss,' so Lily knew it must have been bad), and sat looking out the window at the traffic.

It was another warm, sunny day, but there was a light breeze blowing through the trees that made it tolerable. She'd only been here a few days, but Lily was going to miss this place — the palm lined streets, the bright pops of colour that dotted the city, the sun on her skin. She'd already gotten a ton of new freckles, across her cheeks, down her arms, on her shoulders — she was sure that if she stayed here any longer, they'd start to merge and finally give her something that looked like a tan.

Going to Iceland after this was a unique kind of torture.

Mary texted her fifteen minutes later as Lily was walking out of the cafe — _He's ready to go! I'm leaving now to catch my flight. See you in Iceland! Xx_

Lily texted back her thanks before she slid her sunglasses back over her eyes, adjusted her bag on her shoulder, and started the short walk towards James' house.

She could've called a car, but she wanted to take a few more minutes to prepare herself. And anyway, she wanted to feel what she could of the sun on her skin, to soak up the last bit of warmth before they headed north.

It wasn't going to be _that_ cold there next week, but it wasn't going to be Spain either.

By the time she arrived at James' house fifteen minutes later, the car was already parked out front. She leaned her head into the back, said hello to their driver, and dropped her bag in the boot before she went to fetch James.

She opened the door and stuck her head in, but didn't bother walking all the way in or even shutting the door. 'James!'

'Up here!'

'Come on down! We've got to head out.'

'Can you come up here for a sec?'

Nope.

'We've got to go now!'

She couldn't hear it from here, but she would bet her life that James had sighed heavily before he turned out of his room and started down the stairs.

'You're late today.' He smiled at her as he stepped down into the entryway and he ghosted his fingers along her hip as they turned and started out the front door.

Lily swallowed hard and avoided looking him in the eye.

'I figured you'd like a bit of quiet this morning. It's been a while since you've had some time to yourself.'

They went round the back of the car and James' dropped his bag beside hers in the boot.

'I would rather have spent the day with you.'

Lily shut the boot and walked around the side of the car without saying anything. James hesitated at the back before he followed suit and opened the door opposite hers.

Lily noticed that he was careful to sit far apart from her on the seat.

He turned to her as the driver pulled away from the pavement and turned into traffic. 'What's the matter?'

Lily glanced at him before she looked back out the window. 'Nothing's the matter.'

James was quiet for a minute. Lily could see his reflection in the car window, could see him looking at her, but she didn't turn around and she didn't say anything more.

'Are you sure?'

Lily turned and looked at him then, hoped that the look on her face was more convincing than she sounded. 'Yeah, James. I'm sure.'

She should tell him. They should talk about it. She should say that she hasn't stopped thinking about kissing him since the car, that she wanted to kiss him every single day for the rest of her goddamn life, that she was so angry about this whole fucking thing that she sometimes couldn't even think straight. She wanted to think of a way out, wanted to come up with something that they could say to Peter, to come up with a plan because she knew that Marlene would help her and she and James were clever and maybe they'd find a way.

There were a million things she wanted to tell him, but none of them were wise.

Because the truth was that she was terrified of the depth of her feelings for him. She was terrified that they'd get out of this show and the whole thing would fall apart because of the pressure everyone else in the world will be putting on them. That having photographers follow them around and never having a moment of peace and having their faces smeared across every gossip rag in the UK would break something that has the potential to be the best relationship she's ever had with the best man she's ever known.

They couldn't be together.

Not like this.

And so even though it was going to kill her and even though she was going to replay the car in her head every single day until they finished shooting, everything she was about to do was going to be worth it if it meant that they get out of this goddamn show alive.


	29. Chapter 28

**I know that this is way later than I usually post, but this chapter needed a lot of work.**

 **Let me put it this way - it was 1900 words when I started editing this morning.**

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By the time they got to Reykjavik that evening, it was well past ten. Lily had half expected that they'd be getting off the plane in the dark, but the sky she saw through the windows as they walked through the airport was a warm, soft orange, like the sun was just getting ready to go down.

James raised his eyebrow at her as they walked through the sliding glass doors onto the pavement to wait for the car. 'This is weird as hell.'

Lily laughed, because god it was just weird on so many levels, wasn't it?

They'd been civil enough to one another on the plane. They'd sat quietly next to one another, had laughed and joked about little things as they thought of them, and had maintained a steady enough stream of conversation. But the cheeky, flirty side of James that she'd seen all week after the kiss was totally gone — something that struck her as odd now that they were alone and there were no cameras on them and there was literally nothing stopping them from going at it in the airport bathroom. In his place, there was this softer, quieter, more concerned James, one that watched her when he thought she wasn't looking and studied her expressions more than he usually did.

He looked like he was waiting for the other shoe to drop, and his apparent nervousness at what was coming twisted hard in Lily's stomach.

She wasn't sure if she wanted him to be surprised at what she was eventually going to have to say, but she didn't want him to be waiting for it either.

'Yeah,' she walked down to the corner so she could lean up against the building instead of having to lean up against the wall of windows that made up most of the pick up area, 'it is.'

'What time does the sun rise in the morning do you think?' James asked, stuffing his hands into the pockets of his joggers and smiling at her like they were playing some sort of game. 'Like four?'

They googled it and immediately regretted it.

'Three in the morning?!' James looked beside himself. 'How are we supposed to get any sleep?'

'I reckon the house has blackout curtains,' Lily said. 'They'd have to or else no one would ever get any sleep.'

James covered a yawn with the back of his hand. 'They better. I'm bloomin exhausted.'

The house, as it turned out, did have blackout curtains, which James drew the minute he walked into his room a half an hour later. Lily leaned back up against the wall beside the door while James threw his bag onto the floor and collapsed onto the bed. He groaned as soon as his head hit the pillow, a deep, rumbling sound that made Lily shift her weight between her feet.

'God,' he slid around on top of the duvet and snuggled even further into bed, 'this might be the most comfortable bed I've had so far.' He turned his head on his pillow so he was looking at her. 'Want to feel?'

So flirty James wasn't _entirely_ gone then.

Lily cleared her throat, shook her head. 'I've got to get going. Benjy's waiting for me downstairs.'

James shifted, pushed up so that he was sitting, his legs dangling over the side of the bed. And she knew, in that moment, in the look on his face, that she was not going to like where this was going.

'Can we talk before you go? Just for a minute?'

'I —' She sucked in a breath and watched as James' brow creased. 'I really should go, James. It's late.'

James studied her for a moment, his brow furrowed and the corner of his lip between his teeth. Lily knew he wanted to say something, that he wanted to call her on what he had to know was total bullshit on her part, but he just sat there, his feet on the floor, and stared at her like he was waiting for her to crack.

She just stood there silently and stared back, and eventually, James decided that she wasn't going to elaborate on her excuse any further.

But he also wasn't going to back off that easily.

'We haven't really talked since Barcelona.'

 _Barcelona_ — the word hung in the air between them and Lily felt her heart pick up speed in her chest. Because "Barcelona" — though he'd said it to avoid having to point to exactly what he meant — had the exact opposite effect that he'd intended.

Because "Barcelona" took her right back to the car, to the look in his eyes when she pulled back and she felt the heat in his gaze sink straight through her skin. It made her remember the feeling of his hands on her skin and his fingertips teasing the edge of her pants and the way he'd exhaled shakily as she dragged her lips across his jaw….

"Barcelona" ignited the feeling in her gut that she'd relegated to the back-burner and spent the week steadfastly ignoring.

She swallowed. 'We've had a lot going on.'

James nodded slowly. 'Yeah. But we haven't got anything going on now, have we?'

She couldn't keep looking at him. Even across the room, even with her back pressed up against the wall, there was something magnetic about the way he was looking at her. It was like Inverness all over again except, this time, she didn't have to imagine how it would feel to have his hands on her. She knew exactly how he would respond, knew how he would touch her, but even still, she knew that she only knew half the story.

There were still so many paths his hands hadn't travelled.

She looked down at her shoes.

'I've got an early morning. I — we have a production meeting.'

James was quiet for so long that Lily wouldn't have been surprised to look up and see that he'd left. She was just about to say something else — she wasn't sure what — when James sighed and said, 'Well, alright then.'

Lily looked up just as James looked down at his knees.

'What time do I need to be up for the ice caves tomorrow?' His voice sounded hard, mechanical, and she wanted to take a few steps back and adjust her answer, to do anything to get him to sound like himself again.

She knew that this was for the best, though.

And maybe, this way, James would know where her head was at without her actually having to say anything.

She cleared her throat. 'It's a two hour drive and then a pretty decent hike, but we've got daylight until fucking midnight, so we aren't in too much of a rush. Mary already took the group date cards over to the hotel, so everyone knows the plan for tomorrow.'

'Yeah, but what time?'

'Uh…' Lily pulled her mobile out of her back pocket to check the schedule again. 'Ten. My production meeting is at eight, so we'll be leaving right after that to come pick you up and drive out to the glacier.'

James nodded. 'Who did we decide on again for the group date?'

Lily ticked them off on her fingers. 'Sian, Saoirse, Sarah, Rachel, Amelia, and Summer.'

James nodded before he caught a yawn. 'Oh, yeah,' he covered his mouth to hide his yawn, then reached up under his glasses to rub his eyes. 'That's right. That'll be fun.'

Lily nodded. 'Should be.'

They looked at each other again for a moment before Lily cleared her throat and pushed up off the wall. 'Alright, well. Goodnight.'

'Goodnight.'

She turned on her heel and started towards the door, only looking back when she turned to shut the door softly behind her.

She expected James to be watching her — if she was honest, a part of her wanted him to be watching her — but he was sitting just where she'd left him, looking down at his knees, his shoulders curved like he was carrying a heavy weight across them, and Lily's heart immediately climbed into her throat.

She didn't — this wasn't what she wanted.

Still, she pulled the door shut without saying another word and started slowly back down the corridor.

Benjy was smirking at her when she walked into the foyer.

'Took you awhile.'

Lily nudged him lightly with her elbow and laughed as casually as she could manage as they walked out of the house and climbed into the back of the town car. 'We were just going over some plans for tomorrow.'

'Really?' Benjy raised an eyebrow at her as he settled in beside her.

Lily leaned her head up against the window and closed her eyes. 'Yes. I told you, it's nothing. We're nothing.'

 _We're nothing._

It echoed in her ears and she felt a lump start in her throat. She swallowed hard against it.

Benjy scoffed. 'I'll believe that when you two stop looking at each other like you're dying to see one another naked.'

Lily just shifted her head against the window to get more comfortable and pretended she hadn't heard him.

Lily dropped her bag on the floor when she walked into her hotel room fifteen minutes later, nudged it up against the wall with her foot so that it wasn't in the way. She couldn't be arsed to unpack it right now, probably wouldn't unpack the entire time that there were going to be here in Iceland. She just didn't see the point anymore, unpacking all her things and then having to repack them all again a few days later. She'd much rather just grab a few pieces out of the bag, throw them onto the chest of drawers, and grab outfits at random. It wasn't like she ever wore anything all that complicated anyway that she needed to worry about matching things.

She kicked her shoes off beside the chest of drawers across from the bed and went back to rummage in her bag for her bag of shower things and a t-shirt to wear to bed. She tossed the first one she found — an old, slightly ragged shirt from university — onto the floor at her feet and peeled her current outfit off. She threw her dirty clothes onto the chair in the corner near the bed and tugged the t-shirt over her head before she grabbed her bag and padded off into the bathroom.

She'd only spent a few minutes in the bathroom — just used the toilet, washed her face, put on some moisturiser, and brushed her teeth — but there was something about those last few steps in her night routine that made the exhaustion she'd just been holding off hit her like a tidal wave. She tugged the bauble out of her hair and tossed it carelessly onto the counter, clicked off the light, and shuffled back out into the hotel.

She'd just collapsed into bed when she remembered that she'd left her charger in her bag and her mobile in the back pocket of her jeans.

She swore more loudly than was strictly necessary as she pushed herself up out of bed and walked back over to the other side of the room to grab her things. She lifted the phone up and glanced down at the screen out of habit and noticed that she had a few messages from Benjy. She sighed, pressed her thumb to the unlock button, and sat down on the edge of her bed.

 _Benjy Fenwick: Sorry I teased you earlier_

 _Benjy Fenwick: We just haven't talked about this whole thing since, what? Hometown?_

 _Benjy Fenwick: And I'm sure you're going to be upset with me for pointing it out because "you dont want to talk about it", but something definitely changed while we were in Barcelona_

 _Benjy Fenwick: And I know you're going to pretend taht you don't know what I'm talking about, but you know that I'm here for you, right? If you ever want to talk about it LIly I'm here for you xx_

Lily looked at the messages for a minute, and, because (only because) she knew that Benjy would see the blue ticks, she typed out a quick reply.

 _Lily Evans: I know you're here for me. I'm not ready to talk about it, but I promise I will when I'm ready — thanks, Fen xx_

She locked her mobile before she plugged it in and dropped it heavily onto the bedside table. She leant over, after crawling awkwardly underneath the blankets, to flick the switch beside the outlet and, save the small strip of light that she noticed along the bottom of the curtains, the room went completely dark.

She expected to fall asleep right away — the heaviness of her lids and the deep exhaustion in her bones were nearly overwhelming — but, of course, because things weren't bad enough, the moment the light clicked off, her mind turned on and immediately started whirling.

She couldn't stop thinking about the look on James' face. The one in the car on the way to the airport in Barcelona, the one he'd just given her back in his room. She knew that he knew, that he was waiting for her to drop something absolutely horrific on him, and she could only imagine the things that he was sitting in his room and thinking about her right now.

Thinking about how she was a coward for not just telling him that she was backing out again. For being enough of a coward to back out again in the first place. About how she was awful for toying with his feelings. About how he couldn't believe — after his _mother_ had talked to her — that she would kiss him and then run away and then, and _then_ , she didn't even have the strength to sit him down and have a conversation with him about it.

But really, what did it matter, talking to him? Things never went the way that she wanted to anyway whenever they talked. They always ended up dancing around the same things, never ended up really getting anywhere. They just had a row, ignored one another in a bitter silence for a few days, and then things gradually went back to normal after one of them apologised for being an arse.

Okay, after _she_ apologised.

And maybe that wasn't enough reason to avoid telling him, but it wasn't exactly compelling enough evidence to strike up the conversation either.

But still — it wasn't fair not to tell him. It wasn't fair to keep him on tenterhooks, waiting to see if she was going to snog him again or if she was going to tell him to fuck off and then stick her head in the sand.

She'd tell him tomorrow. When she and Benjy went to pick him up for the ice caves, she'd pull him aside and she'd tell him.

Assuming, of course, she could figure out what to say.

And that, naturally, is what she spent the rest of the night agonising over.

She wasn't sure when she finally ended up dropping off to sleep — the last time she checked the time on her phone it was half four — but at some point, she managed to think herself into enough circles that she either came to something that seemed (in the middle of the night) like a solution or she'd just made herself so confused that her brain simply refused to participate in the exercise anymore.

Because no matter what she thought up, no matter how she thought she could tell it, there was nothing she could say that wasn't repeating a conversation that they'd already had. She thought of all the same lines — the contract, the media, her job — and she already knew what James would say. She ran the conversations through in her head, did his parts in his voice, and every time things ended up exactly where they'd been before.

Cross and hurt and no closer to a mutually agreeable solution than they had been when they'd started.

She thought that going back to how they'd been at the end of James' hometown and the beginning of Barcelona might work. When they were back in that light, playful place, when they talked and laughed and were normal. She thought that might be the best option, but she hadn't kissed him then. She hadn't known what he tasted like. Hadn't known how firm his body would feel under her hands.

Those things had been imaginary then, things she'd dreamt up when she was in her room, alone, at night, but now she had memories, _vivid_ memories, and she didn't know how they were supposed to go back to normal after that.

And the James in her head — and, truth be told, the Marlene and Benjy in her head, too — kept saying that maybe this wasn't about going back. That maybe this thing with them was about going _forward_.

And that was all well and good, but Lily didn't know the first thing about how to move this forward. And she'd told him, had told him that first day — she'd take risks, but only when her job wasn't on the line.

All told, she was absolutely fucking exhausted the next morning when she walked into Conference Room B, the space that Peter had had one of the PAs reserve for their production meeting. She was glad that they'd reserved a conference space this time — it was much better than meeting in one of their hotel rooms like they'd had to do back in London because no one had thought to reserve a place.

She could go the rest of her life without seeing Peter on a bed ever again and that would be absolutely fine with her.

One of the PAs had run out and gotten trays of coffee and pastries, and Lily grabbed a cup from the centre, a handful of tiny creamers, and a pastry that looked like it had almonds and maybe some kind of custard in.

She took a bite as she settled heavily into her seat and she was fairly sure that her eyes rolled straight back into her head.

This pastry wasn't going to cure her exhaustion, but god damn was it going to carry her through this meeting.

The rest of the producers were already there, so Lily got to chatting with Cara and Kate while they waited for Peter and Marlene to show up. Cara was in the middle of telling Lily a story about the night before (apparently Summer had convinced Marc to go out and get them all face masks from somewhere and the contestants had had a pamper night) when Marlene walked in and settled into the free seat next to Lily.

'Dorcas texted me last night,' she said, smiling hello at Kate and Cara as she leaned across Lily to grab a coffee and what looked like a giant cinnamon roll covered in light pink icing.

'Oh yeah?' Lily turned a bit in her seat and took a sip of her coffee. 'What did she say?'

'She said it was great seeing me and she wants to take me out as soon as I'm back.'

'Mar,' Lily smiled and nudged her lightly with her elbow. 'That's great. Are you excited?'

'Yeah, I —'

'Alright, everyone, settle down.'

It took all of Lily's energy (and another bite of her pastry) to keep the scowl off her face.

Peter shut the door hard behind him and practically threw himself down into the chair at the head of the table. He grabbed the coffee mug one of the PAs had left in front of his seat and then, after he grabbed a muffin from the tray in front of him, resumed scowling at everyone.

What in the _fuck_ was wrong with him today?

'So, week six.' Peter scanned their faces slowly and then took a long, exaggerated sip of his coffee. 'Week fucking six and we still haven't gotten a kiss.'

Oh _fuck_.

Fuck, fuck, _fuck_.

Everyone shifted uncomfortably in their seats and avoided looking at Lily (except Marc, arsehole, who caught her eye and raised an eyebrow at her before he took a pointed sip of his drink).

She knew that this was part of her responsibility in this position — encouraging James to engage in the physical part of his relationships with the women on camera — but she… well, stupidly, she'd hoped that nobody had noticed that James hadn't done more than give anyone a slightly prolonged hug or a kiss on the cheek since they'd started filming a few weeks ago.

James had managed to cultivate this sense among the contestants, from what Lily could tell of their interactions with him, at least, and what Lily picked up from Kate and Cara and George whenever they caught a few minutes to talk while they were on dates, that James was the type of person that was a bit more reserved physically. That he was going to show physical affection once he felt emotionally comfortable with the people involved. Lily knew (because George had told her in Barcelona last week) that Zoe had been annoyed that James hadn't really shown any physical interest in anyone, but then Zoe had gone home and Lily hadn't really thought about it much after that.

Besides, she knew that James wasn't the type to withhold physical affection — if anything, he was always laying it on thick — and so the fact that he wasn't hanging all over the contestants and kissing them….

Well, the really selfish, jealous part of her was quite keen for that to continue.

But now….

Fuck.

She took a deep breath and bit the bullet.

'I know that James hasn't kissed anyone yet,' she leaned forward in her seat so that she could get a better view of Peter's expression, 'but from our conversations, it just doesn't seem like he really feels comfortable enough with any of the contestants yet.'

'What the fuck kind of man is he then?' Peter snapped. 'What do you mean he doesn't _feel comfortable enough_?! What more does he need? They're there and they're willing!'

Lily took a deep breath and pressed her palm into the table to steady herself. She really, really needed to not shout at him today, but she was tired and her patience was wearing thin, and for the love of god this was coming too close to too many emotional things for her and she was not ready to have to think about this this morning.

'He doesn't feel like he's built up an intimate enough relationship with anyone just yet,' she said. She leaned back in her chair and tried to look coolly confident. 'He's not there.'

'Well, he needs to get there.'

Lily scoffed before she could control the impulse. 'I can't make him get there!'

Peter's entire face went red. 'If Potter doesn't fucking snog someone this week, I swear to god —'

'What are you going to do, Peter?' Marlene snapped, and Lily was glad that Marlene had jumped in because there was no way that Lily was going to say anything coherent or appropriate now that Peter had started in on her like that. 'We can't force him to snog people.'

Peter crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair. 'And why the fuck not?'

'Because,' Marlene leaned halfway across the table and it was clear that she was just keeping it together, 'there are laws about that sort of thing.'

Peter huffed angrily. 'Well, how the _fuck_ am I supposed to make entertaining television if he won't fucking kiss anyone? This isn't some goddamn chastity hour! Lily —' Peter turned his gaze on her and the intensity of it took Lily aback. She'd seen Peter upset before — had seen it directed at her more times than she could count — but there was something about the heat in his eyes just then that was shocking to her.

She had never seen him that fucking disgruntled.

If she didn't know him, she would've been scared of him.

'Put pressure on him. Don't _force_ him,' he said the word like it was a joke, like he was just noting it to placate Marlene, 'but put a hell of a lot of pressure on him. If you don't get a kiss by the end of the week, Potter is _done_ and you can count yourself out of a job the _minute_ we're done filming.'

Done? What the fuck did _done_ even mean?

'I —'

Peter narrowed his eyes. 'Got it?'

Lily sighed heavily, looked down at her hands. 'Got it.'


	30. Chapter 29

**Happy belated to hypergalacticcanniballism on tumblr (omg I know I spelled your url name wrong I CAN'T SPELL I'M SORRY)**

 **Anyway. Enjoy? ;)**

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It took her two full days to talk to James.

Lily delegated whatever tasks she could to Mary to avoid speaking with him — getting the names for dates, coordinating car pick up, communicating information about date activities. Lily told Mary she was doing it because she wanted to give her the chance to try her hand at some more high-level production work, to give her some experience — if Mary suspected anything, and she probably did because she was smart as a whip, she didn't say anything. And for that, Lily was eternally grateful.

She had enough to be getting on with — what, between her own increasingly anxious thoughts and the changes in James' behaviour towards her — without having Mary questioning her on top of it all.

The group date to the ice caves and the two on one snowmobile tour passed without incident, and still, Lily hadn't said more to James than the usual things she'd needed to convince everyone that she wasn't in the middle of an active avoidance campaign. James was noticeably agitated with her, but instead of getting angry and trying to confront her like she thought he might, James just tried to beat her at her own game.

They drove to each date in silence, Benjy looking between them and probably praying for death, and stood far away from them once they were on set. James didn't stand by her side anymore either, didn't send her those long, lingering looks that made her breath catch.

He barely looked at her at all anymore.

And when he did, it was only briefly to acknowledge the fact that she was speaking before he looked back down at his shoes, the horizon, or anything else that wasn't her face.

By the time Monday rolled around, though, and Lily realised that she still hadn't talked to James about Peter's snogging threat, she knew that she was going to have to suck it up and talk to him.

The thought of telling him that she wanted him to go kiss someone else still made her feel like she was going to throw up, but there was nothing else for it at this point. She'd avoided it for so long that she'd basically backed herself into a corner.

Not that she thought telling him earlier really would've fixed anything. It's not like they would've been able to come up with a plan to get him out of it — assuming, of course, that James wanted to be let out of it — and, really, if the idea of kissing one of the contestants was something that he honestly didn't want to do, letting him know that Peter was basically on a warpath to make it happen would have made his dates earlier this week supremely awkward.

At least this way they managed to get some really good dates out of him.

And she didn't even let herself imagine the alternative — her bringing this up with James and him happily agreeing to do it. It wasn't possible that he would be interested in kissing one of them.

Right?

She wasn't sure how he was going to take her re-initiating conversation with this particular bit of information, especially just before his solo date with Liza, but she really didn't see what she could do about it now (besides go back and time and be a bit more mature about this whole thing, which, honestly, she could say about a lot of her decisions lately). She offered to take over for Mary for this last date, but Mary was determined to at least round out date prep for the week if Lily would let her. She'd already delivered Liza's date card to the contestant house, had coordinated pick up and drop off with James, and had gone over all the details she could think of, and she wanted to see it through.

Lily couldn't deny her that.

When James climbed into the limo an hour before the date, though, and pulled the door shut behind him, Lily wished she had. Because now, instead of being able to have this conversation in the house, in James' warm room, where they were surrounded by walls and definitely no cameras and Lily had a very easy escape route, they were going to have to have this conversation in the car where the only way Lily could escape was if she barrel rolled out the side door into the middle of the softest looking stretch of road she could find.

Benjy had immediately ditched them when Lily told him what she was planning to tell James in the car — he "wanted no part of that argument" and would "see you on the glaciers, assuming you don't kill one another".

Lily was ready to kill Benjy now, but she supposed she understood his position. He'd already sat through two silent, incredibly awkward car rides this week, and a shouting match, as this was likely to be, wasn't going to be any better. And, honestly, at this point, he deserved something of a break.

And probably a medal.

And a pint. Or six.

And so, yes, she understood Benjy's position and she absolutely didn't fault him one bit, but she couldn't help wanting to kill him a little bit when James climbed into the car and pulled the door shut behind him.

Because she and James hadn't been alone like this since the car in Barcelona.

Because it was all she could think about now as he settled into the seat opposite her. The way his hair had felt between her fingers. The sharpness of his jaw against her hand. His lips against hers.

He looked over and caught her watching him and it took everything she had to keep from ducking her head.

'What?'

She hadn't expected James to speak, and the surprise combined with the sharpness of his tone made her jump.

She brushed her hair out of her eyes. 'What?'

James frowned at her. 'Why are you staring at me?'

'I'm not.'

'Lily.'

'I —'

She fell silent, and James, apparently, was tired of pushing her for even the smallest bit of information. He sat in silence and waited for her to have something vaguely coherent to say.

The trouble was, now that they were talking again — assuming you could call this talking — the last thing that she wanted to do was talk to him about what she had on her mind. It would destroy even this broken, angry conversation between them, this thing she had to say.

But still, she had to say it. Peter would not hesitate to destroy both their lives if she didn't and she really, _really_ didn't want to give him any excuse to start looking for ammunition to use against them.

She didn't think there was any evidence of their… transgression… but if it existed, if even the _suggestion_ of anything existed, Peter would find it.

If it existed, Peter wouldn't hesitate to use it.

'James, you — Peter wants —'

Whatever James had been expecting, it didn't seem like it was that. He huffed angrily, leaned back in his seat, and crossed his arms. 'What? What does that arsehole want?'

Lily ran a hand through her hair and tried to buy herself a moment to figure out what to say. He was already so fucking annoyed and there was no way that this was going to end well, but it wasn't like delaying the inevitable was going to make it any easier. She took a deep breath and just let it fall out of her — mostly.

'You haven't snogged anyone yet and — uh —'

James immediately snapped. 'Are you fucking kidding me? Are you seriously asking me to _make out_ with someone else? _Seriously?!_ '

'James, I —' She sat up straighter in her chair, tried to pull her shoulders back so she looked more certain than she felt. 'You're on this show to find a wife, and —'

'I _told_ you — Lily, I told you, I don't want to do this anymore.' He was practically pleading with her and she'd thought ignoring him was hard, had thought his sad looks and frowns and frustrated glares were hard, but this? _This._

'Lily, I —'

Lily swallowed hard and shook her head. 'James, it's too late! We've gone over this! You can't just up and quit because you've decided that you have the hots for me!'

It was over the line and she knew it, but they couldn't be talking about him quitting again. It wasn't an option, not today, not when she needed him to understand just how _fucked_ they were.

She had only seen James look like he hated someone (Peter) once, but the look in his eyes just then…. It came close.

'Oh my _fucking_ god! Lily, you can't be serious.'

Lily crossed her arms. 'How would you describe it, then, James? Would you say that this is a relationship? Is that how you're going to word it?'

'No, Lily, of course not,' James snapped, 'because if I worded it like that, then we'd be going against my precious contract!'

Lily rolled her eyes. 'Here we go.'

'Yes! Here we fucking go. Because once again, here we are, shouting at one another about a piece of paper that neither of us really cares about.'

'I care about it!' Lily jabbed a finger hard into her chest. 'I fucking care about it, James, and you should care about it, too.'

James threw his hands up. 'Why? Why should I care about that piece of fucking paper more than I care about you?'

She hadn't at all expected his response and it knocked her off balance in her reply. 'I — James, you — you signed it —'

James took advantage of her confusion — he leaned across the car so that he was within reaching distance of her, and, when she didn't lean back, he lowered his voice so that he was no longer shouting at her.

'So what? I signed it before I knew about you. Before I had any idea that this was —' He shook his head slowly, like he couldn't find the words, and Lily's stomach tightened.

'Lily, I signed it before I'd even _met_ you. I had no idea what I was doing. I never would have signed it if I known that I'd feel even a _tenth_ of what I feel for you right now.'

He must have seen something softening in her features because he reached his hand across the space between them and threaded his fingers lightly through hers.

'James —'

He squeezed her fingers, ran his thumb over her knuckle. 'I'm serious. Every day, all I think about is you. These other women — they're great, but…. Evans, they're not you.'

Lily was shaking her head before James had even finished speaking.

'James, we've been _over_ this.'

He dropped her hand.

'Yeah, Lily,' James crossed his arms, 'yeah, we have. Trouble is, you can't seem to figure out what the fuck you actually want.'

'What are you talking about?'

'One minute, we can't because I have a contract, then you're telling me you have feelings for me, then I have a contract again and it's not fair to the other women on the show, then you're snogging the absolute life out of me in the back of a car, and then you're fucking ignoring me! And when you're not ignoring me, you're telling me that I need to start kissing other women!'

'I don't know what you want me to do!'

'What I've always wanted you to do,' James leaned across the car again and, for a moment, Lily thought he was going to take her face in his hands and kiss her. Instead, he just looked at her, his eyes dark and his breath coming in short, sharp bursts.

'I want you to pick a fucking path, Lily. I want you to pick a path and stick to it. I can't be jerked around like this. I _won't_.'

Maybe he expected a different answer. Maybe he thought that she was going to lean across the seat, like she had in Spain, and run her fingers through his hair and kiss him until they forgot what they were even arguing about.

But Lily was determined to stick to her guns this time. Was determined to stop pulling him along behind her, because it wasn't fair for her to keep him on a string when he was supposed to be developing relationships with these women.

She didn't want him dating them, but it wasn't fair for her to stop him. And if she wasn't going to give this thing between them a go — and she wasn't — then she needed to step back. She didn't want to watch him get close to the contestants, didn't want to watch him start to fall in love with anyone else, but —

She just —

She took a slow, deep breath and held his gaze as she replied.

'Then I want you to kiss Liza.'

The car pulled to a stop outside the helicopter field and James and Lily sat in silence for a moment, James glowering at her while Lily desperately tried to keep herself from backpedaling and taking it all back. Finally, James snapped and spoke first.

'You want me to kiss her?' James was looking at her like he absolutely hated her and, honestly, Lily couldn't even remotely blame him. 'Fine.'

James slid across the car, shoved the door open, and walked swiftly towards the line of cameras just beside the helicopter.

Lily was on edge the entire date.

She told herself it was the bumping and shifting of the helicopter that was making her anxious, but really, it was the way that James had leaned over to help Liza adjust her headset, the way that he leaned into her touch, the way he rested his hand on her knee. She could hear what they were talking about over her own headset — she tried not to listen — and hearing him ask her about her parents, her work, her plans for her future….

Lily had half a mind to just jump out of the helicopter and be done with it.

James reached over and took Liza's hand to help her out onto the glacier. She stumbled a bit over her shoes and James' hand slid from hers and wrapped around her waist to steady her.

Lily thought she was going to be sick.

And then it got progressively worse over the next few hours and Lily _knew_ she was going to be sick.

They were so — so chatty and snuggly and they kept _laughing._ James only looked over at Lily once the entire day, when he tucked Liza under his arm as they climbed the last bit of the glacier.

Lily had tried to hold his gaze, to tell him that she was sorry, _so sorry,_ but James had turned back to Liza almost immediately and laughed at something she'd said.

Lily'd thought, though, that that was going to be enough. That he would walk around and laugh like an idiot with Liza and get all close to her and that that would be enough. She knew that she shouldn't have been hoping for it — after all, her _job_ was on the line — but she couldn't help the desperation in her chest and she watched James and Liza circle around one another as the day progressed and she couldn't stop the relief when they turned to head back towards the helicopter and he still hadn't —

But then they were climbing back down the glacier, Liza's cheeks pink from the sun, and James pulled her to a stop in front of the cameras and suddenly Lily knew what was going to happen before it happened.

James brushed his fingers along Liza's jaw, asked her something that Lily couldn't hear. Liza nodded, a slow smile spreading across her face, and then she was pushing herself up onto her toes and her mouth was on his.

Watching him kiss her — it was as gut-wrenching as Lily thought it would be.

There was something tender about the way that he held her, the way he ran his hand along her jaw before threading his fingers into her hair, the way his other hand pressed into her hip. Liza stepped forward so that she was flush against him, and Lily felt her stomach lurch before she was able to turn away.

She didn't turn around until Jax shouted, 'Cut!'

The ride back to the hotel was deadly silent.

Benjy, who, unfortunately, was not going to be able to get out of the ride _back_ to the hotel now that the whole production crew was there to witness him ditching them, had tried to start conversation with them a few times after they'd finished filming James' diary (the shortest, tensest diary they'd filmed yet), but he'd given up and turned to his mobile after his attempts failed to get either of them to do more than glare at him.

It wasn't fair that they were making Benjy sit in silence, but Lily reassured herself with the thought that Benjy was probably texting his wife and didn't care (much) about the fact that he was sitting alone in a car with two people that looked like they absolutely hated each other.

At least, she hoped that James only _looked_ like he hated her.

Though where she got off expecting anything from him at this point….

When they pulled up outside James' house an hour later, James shifted in his seat and Lily thought that he was turning to finally say something to her.

When she looked up, though, he was looking at Benjy.

'Sorry we made you sit through this, mate,' James said.

Benjy shook his head. 'No worries. I know that what you two've got going on is…' he shot Lily a look and she widened her eyes in warning. 'Complicated.'

If James was surprised that Benjy knew anything about them, he didn't let on. He just sighed, and though he moved like he was going to look at Lily, he managed to control the impulse before he actually met her eye.

'Well, per my contract, we haven't got anything going on.'

Lily glared furious holes into the side of James' head at that, but he still didn't turn his head to look at her. Lily could see Benjy looking at her out of the corner of her eye with a pitying look on his face, but she refused to acknowledge it.

'Anyway,' James pushed his glasses back up his nose with his index finger. 'Goodnight, Fen. I'll see you tomorrow at the ceremony.'

Benjy nodded and said goodbye, and James climbed out of the car without another word.

The car pulled out of the drive the minute James was through the front door, and Lily and Benjy sat in silence for a minute before Benjy finally heaved a heavy enough sigh to warrant Lily's attention.

'What?' She hadn't meant to snap at him, but she was at the end of her rope today.

'Don't start with me,' Benjy said. 'What is wrong with you two?'

'You saw what happened on the date, Fen. Don't pretend you don't know what's wrong.'

'Lil —'

'What?!'

Benjy shot her a stern look and Lily fell silent. Benjy let the quiet hover between them for a moment before he continued. 'You knew that he was going to be kissing other women, Lily. That's part of the whole reason that he's on this show.'

Lily crossed her arms. 'You think I don't know that?'

'You're certainly acting like it's a goddamn surprise.'

'Jesus christ, Benjy, what do you want me to do?'

'Anything else!' Benjy threw his hands up. 'Literally anything else is better than this! You can't keep saying that it's done, that you're over him and this whole thing because there's no way that you can be together and then turn right around and start pining for him and getting jealous and arguing with him left, right, and bloody centre! You have to choose one!'

'I'm _trying!_ Do you think it's easy to just get over him at the drop of a fucking hat? He's — Fen, he's….'

'I know,' Benjy's tone softened as he leaned over and rested his hand briefly on her knee. 'I know. But god damn it, Lily, you're doing this to yourself!'

'How am I doing this to myself?'

'There is a clear way out of this. You, for some reason, continue to fucking insist that it's not an option.'

She frowned at him. 'Because it _isn't.'_

Benjy raised a challenging eyebrow at her. 'Why not?'

'Oh for fucks sake, I can't go over this again. Literally every time I talk about it, it comes round to this. Why don't you just get him to quit the show? Get him sued, lose your job, get so much negative media attention that no one in London will ever pay for you to work for them again! Your relationship, new as it is, will definitely survive that shitstorm! No way that goes wrong!'

She took a sharp breath to try and steady herself. 'I'm not being ridiculous just for the sake of it. I genuinely don't see what everyone the fuck else sees when they tell me that James just needs to leave the show and it will magically fix everything.'

'Every relationship is hard, Lily —'

Lily held her hand up at him. 'Don't you start patronising me.'

'I'm —' Benjy heaved a heavy sigh, closed his eyes for a moment to gather himself. 'I'm not trying to. I'm sorry.'

Lily nodded and Benjy continued. 'I'm not saying, I don't think _anyone_ is saying, that leaving would magically fix anything. It would just end the absolutely insane suffering that you're both forcing yourselves to endure. You're going to have to keep watching him kissing other women. You're going to have to watch him get closer to them over the next few weeks. He's going to meet their _families._ He's going to _propose._ Is that something that you really want?'

Lily turned to look out the window. The sun was just starting to dip down behind the few tall buildings in the skyline and everything was coated in a soft, golden glow. She noticed the giant mural on the building up ahead, the one across the street from their hotel, and she sighed before she turned to look back at Benjy.

He raised an eyebrow when their eyes met.

'I obviously don't _want_ to watch him with other people, but I want him to be happy. I don't think that he's going to be happy with me. Not like this. So if that means I take a bit of a step back and I have to watch him fucking snogging everyone else, then fine.'

Benjy looked at her for a long moment, and Lily thought he might be getting ready to say something else, but then the car pulled into the drive outside their hotel and Lily climbed out before he could reply.

* * *

 **see you on Sunday x**


	31. Chapter 30

**Happy Sunday!** **I've been weeding my front garden all morning and coming back inside to give this a final edit was the best part of my morning I stg. I mean, now I have to go back outside and finish up and I just alksjfasdfj SOMEONE COME SAVE ME I DON'T WANT TO DO THIS BEING AN ADULT IS STUPID**

 **Anyway - enjoy x**

* * *

Despite what she'd said in the car the night before, Lily wasn't at all ready to watch James at the ceremony the next night.

Kissing Liza on that goddamn glacier seemed to have uncorked the softer, more affectionate side of him, and he was a handsy bastard the entire night.

Marlene, who knew by now that James had kissed Liza on their date the day before, kept looking at Lily with these sympathetic looks, and while a part of Lily was appreciative of the support, she mostly just wanted to strangle Marlene to stop her looking at her like that.

It was hard enough to get through all the talking and laughing and flirting without thinking that Marlene was just sitting there pitying her.

It helped to remember that Marlene was also fairly cross with her for insisting that it be that way.

All the contestants were on edge that night, too, and for good reason. James was eliminating three women at the ceremony that night, and, other than Liza, no one really seemed that confident in their place. Sian and Claire, usually content to hang back and let other women absorb James' attention, were more aggressive in their pursuit of him for the first time since they'd started filming.

And though James' rule about not snogging when there were other contestants around managed to stay intact, he did seem to get awfully close a few times.

In the end, Jade, Sian, and Saoirse were sent home — the six remaining women tried their best to celebrate quietly as James walked the eliminated contestants out, and Lily watched with the strangest sensation in her gut as he said goodbye to them in turn and helped them into the cars waiting in the drive.

Lily knew it was a bit odd, but she couldn't help the rush of affection she felt towards him as she watched him take his time instead of just rushing the contestants out of there. He gave each of them a warm hug, said they really were wonderful people, that this decision of his wasn't a judgment on them. Said that he hoped they found happiness because they really, truly deserved it.

He really was too good for a show like this, he was.

James lingered on the pavement as the cars drove away, hands in his pockets as he shifted his weight restlessly between his feet. He was there for a minute, maybe two, after the cars had gone before he pulled in a breathe, straightened up, and walked back into the house.

He made some bright, smiley speech about how excited he was for Dublin next week when he got back into the lounge, and Lily sort of half-listened until the cameras cut. She darted forward the moment the cameras shut off, started moving through the crowd to try and get to James because she needed to talk to him about his schedule for the next morning, but by the time she got to the centre of the room, James had made his way out past the cameras.

Lily huffed, and it was stupid, what she did then, shouting his name out like an idiot in a room full of people. It was stupid, but at least she had a legitimate excuse if anyone asked.

And people probably weren't paying her much mind anyway.

He turned just as he reached the corridor and his eyes met hers. Everyone else, the contestants, the crew, Marlene, the other producers, everyone else fell away because all she could think about was the way that James was looking at her just then. How the happy, grinning man that had been in the centre of that room a few minutes before had been replaced by this one, this James who looked tired and defeated and _sad_.

And she couldn't — it didn't make sense because he'd seemed so happy with the contestants all night. He'd laughed and smiled and Lily had watched him, more than once, put his hand on the small of someone's back or their elbow or _whatever_ and he'd seemed — he'd seemed so genuine and it didn't make sense that he was standing there now looking at her like this.

James didn't wait for her to figure it out — he looked at her a moment longer before he dropped his gaze, turned on his heel, and headed off to bed without saying goodnight.

Lily slept fitfully that night.

It took her an age to fall asleep and then she kept having the most bizarre dreams and waking herself up and then it took her forever to fall asleep again… she finally gave up around seven that morning and pushed herself up out of bed. She could see the sun shining brightly underneath the blackout curtains and, even though it was basically the last thing she wanted to do, she had a lot of nervous energy to work off before she was travelling alone with James again today.

She grabbed her mobile off her bedside table and texted Marlene —

 _Going for a run — come with?_

She dug her sports bra and a pair of leggings from the bottom of her bag and tied her hair up into a sloppy ponytail while she waited for Marlene's reply. Her mobile buzzed twice as she was tying up her trainers.

 _Marlene McKinnon: who are you and what have you done with Lily?_

 _Marlene McKinnon: I'll meet you in the lobby in five x_

They didn't talk much on their run that morning. Marlene took one look at Lily's face when she met her in the lobby — the dark, almost indigo circles under her eyes, the lines on her forehead — and knew that this run wasn't going to be some light, fun thing that Lily jokingly complained about.

It was about exorcising her demons and building up her strength for the day ahead.

Even though they didn't say anything to one another, it was nice having Marlene there with her while she ran. It was nice not being alone. She let herself get lost in the rhythm of their feet against the pavement and the pain in her bad knee and the sharp burning in her throat because she never remembered to breathe in through her nose until it was too late and her throat was torn to bits by the air and even though none of those things were particularly fun to think about, they were easier to think about than the things swirling in the back of her mind that kept telling her that she was an idiot.

Lily wasn't sure how far they ran — after awhile, the red-roofed houses all started to look the same — but by the time they got back to the hotel almost an hour later, she was dripping with sweat despite the chill outside and her quads kept twitching every few feet as she walked to the lifts and she was pretty sure that they were going to give out and she was going to fall over.

Marlene laughed at her when she braced herself against the handrail in the lift, and Lily told her to fuck off.

She wiped the sweat that was coating her forehead and smeared it onto the front of her leggings. 'We all can't be marathon running superstars, Marlene.'

She took her time getting ready that morning — she didn't have that long before she had to go leave to pick up James, but she had a few hours and so she took them.

She shaved her legs. She stood under the burning hot water and sang an S Club song she only remembered half the words to. She let her conditioner sit in her hair according to the package directions and her hair was the softest it had been in weeks.

By the time she finished getting ready and packed up all her things, though, she still wasn't quite ready to leave her hotel room. She wasn't ready to walk out into the deceptively bright sunshine, the first really sunny day they'd had since they'd arrived, wasn't ready to sit, alone, in a car with James as they drove to the airport. Wasn't ready to fly, alone, with him to Dublin.

She wasn't ready to do any of it, but she didn't exactly have a choice.

She'd planned to do what she did in Barcelona when they got to James' house — just stick her head through the door and shout for James — but when the car pulled up into the drive, James was already sitting out on the front step, his bag between his knees.

He got into the car without saying anything to her. He dropped his bag between his feet, turned, and looked out the window.

And so began their travel day.

They still hadn't said much of anything to one another by the time they arrived in Dublin a few hours later.

They arrived at their hotel, a trendy, Adam-style building on Harcourt Street near St Stephen's Green, in the early evening. It was still hours from twilight, but the sun had already started to dip down a bit over the horizon, a welcome change from the midnight sun they'd lived through the week before.

The studio had rented out the top two floors of the hotel and the rooftop bar for the week — one of Lily's better suggestions — so she and James were, once again, staying in the same place.

Where that had meant a bit of trouble in Scotland, Lily didn't think that it really made much of a difference here in Dublin.

There was no risk of them shagging or something equally ridiculous when they weren't even speaking.

They gathered their things from the car and started up the front steps in silence. The lobby was buzzing when they walked in — talk and laughter floated into the reception area from the adjacent bar and a few people milled around the seating area out front, drinks in hand. The whole space had something of a lounge feel — the lights were low, the blue neon sign over the reception desk gave the space a cool glow, and the furniture, with its dark, rich woods and leather upholstery, was more reminiscent of some posh nightclub than a hotel lobby.

The receptionist popped out from behind one of the Mac computers at the front desk and smiled at them as Lily and James walked in.

'Welcome to the Dean. How can I help you?'

Lily checked impulsively over her shoulder — James had ambled off and was staring into the bar through the modern wooden shelf the hotel had set up to divide the space. Lily smiled at the receptionist.

'I should have two bookings under Evans?'

The receptionist nodded and started pulling up their reservations.

'Oooookay,' he looked up from his screen and grinned. 'I've got the Penthouse here,' he set a small envelope down on Lily's left, 'and room 414.' He set another envelope down on Lily's right.

Lily beamed at him. 'Thank you so much,' she checked his name tag, 'Thomas.'

He nodded and returned her smile. 'Anything you need, Ms Evans, I'm happy to help.'

She turned away to give James his key and found him frowning at his shoes in the far corner. She sighed, straightened her shoulders — this was fine, she was _fine_ — and walked over, key in hand.

'Here.' James looked at her for a moment before he realised she was holding his key. He took it, stuffed it into his pocket, and muttered his thanks.

Lily barely heard it over the clink of glasses and the increasingly loud conversation in the bar.

'You're in the penthouse,' Lily said. 'Fourth floor. I'm in 414, which is just down the hall should you —'

James grabbed his case from the floor and stalked off before Lily could even finish her sentence.

The moment he rounded the corner towards, Lily assumed, the lifts, she sank down into one of the leather chairs beside the wall divider and dropped her head into her hands.

This was intolerable. It was absolutely fucking intolerable.

Maybe he'd thaw if she gave him time, but they'd been together for hours today and he hadn't said more to her than the necessary pleasantries (and he probably only said those because he knew that, somehow, his mother would know if he didn't). She was alright with him keeping his distance — she was keeping her distance — but this? This wasn't that.

He'd completely shut her out. He'd completely shut her out and she couldn't take it.

And she didn't have a choice, really — she knew that. She'd made this fucking bed and now she had no choice but to lie in it, but fucking hell, she hadn't expected it to be so uncomfortable.

She thought he'd be cross, but that he'd get over it soon enough. If the last few days were anything to go on, though, Lily didn't think he'd be getting over it any time soon.

Though, really — maybe it was better like this.

She didn't want him to hate her — the thought alone made her sick, and then when she started thinking about the fact that it was a very real possibility just now —

She didn't want him to hate her, but maybe it was easier if he did.

Any time they tried to just be friendly to one another they got sucked back into this fucking emotional vortex and whipped around until they were battered within an inch of their goddamn lives.

She didn't like it, but she didn't have to like it.

It was better like this.

It was better if he hated her because it really wasn't fair to him when he didn't. When he kept looking at her like she might change her mind, when he watched the way she moved with that _look_ in his eye that made her want to press him up against things…. It wasn't fair for him to want her — and for her to want him to want her — because she couldn't do anything in the way of acting on it.

And anyway, he'd been looking mighty comfortable with the contestants last night.

So maybe he didn't really care that much anymore.

Or maybe he was working himself into a place where that was true.

Either way —

She took a deep breath, pressed the heels of her hands firmly into her forehead, and then she sat up.

She was professional. She was going to get through this week.

She took another deep breath before she grabbed her case, stood, and began making her way through the lobby. She cast one final look at the neon sign over reception as she went and chuckled under her breath.

The electric blue words — _I fell in love here_ — seemed like a cruel (and maybe a little hilarious) joke.

That first night really should have seemed like something of an omen for how the week would go.

This week was tougher than she'd remembered it being last year — it was the last week before hometowns, the week when everything got that much more serious, the week when the women were just... more. They were more open, more vulnerable, more physical. They were committed. They were ready to get the show over with, to give their relationship with James a real shot and to have him to themselves.

Last year, she'd noticed the shift in the way that the women behaved (largely because it was easier to get them to do ridiculous and embarrassing things in front of the camera), but this year?

This year she felt it in her gut.

It was in the way that James' eyes lingered over Liza when he talked to her, the way he brushed his fingers casually against Summer's elbow, the way his eyes crinkled at the corners when he laughed at something Claire said.

She should be used to it, to the acid that simmered in the pit of her stomach whenever she watched him with the contestants. She should be used to it, especially lately, because these days, James was nothing but charming whenever he was around the contestants.

She should be used to it, but when Summer leant over and kissed him on their date in the park on Friday and James didn't pull away?

She should be used to it, but she absolutely fucking was not.

James had another one on one date set for Saturday night, and Lily spent the entire day trying to get herself together.

He hadn't shown _too_ much interest in Sarah to date — he'd been kind to her, but nothing out of the ordinary, nothing like Liza or Summer — but these days? Now that he'd turned on the charm?

Lily had no idea what to expect any more and she spent the entire day tying herself up in knots.

The contestants were staying in a hotel on the other side of the park, so it was only a few minutes before their car was pulling up out front and James was stepping out of the icy silence in the back seat onto the street to meet Sarah.

Benjy shot Lily a look when James was out of earshot and mouthed _this is getting ridiculous._

Lily pretended she didn't see.

She was too busy being nervous to deal with Benjy's crap at the moment.

James and Sarah were laughing about something Sarah was saying when they climbed into the car.

'Sorry, Sarah — sorry,' Lily spluttered until Sarah finally looked up at her, a mildly annoyed expression on her face.

'Yes?'

'If you could start that story again,' Lily said, leaning back in her seat and crossing her arms. 'We want to make sure the whole shot is consistent and we missed half the story outside the car.'

'The camera guy out front of our hotel got the first half,' Sarah said.

Lily smiled blandly back. 'Regardless. If you could.'

She looked at Lily for a moment before she turned to James and launched back into her (remarkably boring) story about some "hilarious" mishap she'd had with a client before she'd left to come on the show.

It didn't seem like the sort of story you really wanted to be telling on national television, but it was Sarah's job on the line, not Lily's.

The StorySlam place was only a short distance away from the hotel (it was close enough that, if they weren't worried about filming, they could have walked), so it was only a few minutes before the car was pulling up outside the pub.

Lily waited for Sarah and James to climb out before she waved goodbye to Benjy and followed them out onto the pavement.

They'd rented the entire place out for the night and hired a bunch of extras to fill the place, so it looked packed when James and Sarah slid through the crowd towards their table at the front. A waiter brought over a pair of pints, and James took a long drink before he smiled at Sarah and they settled in for the night.

The premise of the night's date hadn't really made sense to Lily when they'd booked it and, honestly, it still didn't make sense to her now that she was living it. They'd had one of the writers back in the main studio office write up a few stories for James and some of the extras to read and Sarah had been left to write something up on her own.

She didn't really understand it, the point of the date, but ultimately she didn't really need to understand it. She just needed to sit through it and then make sure there was another car ready for Sarah if James decided to eliminate her at the end of the date.

Despite her overall confusion about the evening, Lily did end up enjoying herself a bit as people cycled through on the stage. There were some really great stories — the one about the old man and some kite festival was one of Lily's favourites — and she found that she didn't hate sitting there listening to them as much as she thought she might at the beginning of the date.

James was scheduled to go third from the end, so Lily started making her way through the crowd as the guy currently on stage started to wrap up his story about… well, Lily wasn't really sure what it was about, but there had been a cougar early on.

She had just made her way backstage when the host called James' name — Lily watched from the wings as the spotlight hit his face and James ducked his head, embarrassed, before he made his way to the stage.

She pretended not to notice the fact that Sarah had totally grabbed his arse.

James' story wasn't all that exciting — they'd written him something bland and inoffensive — so Lily didn't feel bad for not listening to a damn word of his performance. She was more caught up in the way that he was acting it out on stage anyway, in his wild gestures and enthusiastic expressions and the way that he really leaned into the absurdity of the story he was telling.

It didn't matter that Lily had no idea what he was talking about — he was selling the hell out of it.

The applause for James was thunderous compared to everyone else that had gone that night, and Lily bit back a smile as James bowed once, twice, before he turned and started towards the wings. Lily took James by the elbow the moment he got off stage, ignoring his shocked gasp when she took his arm, and led him to a corner far away from anyone who might be able to overhear them.

He frowned down at her as she let go of him.

'What?'

'I —' she frowned. She'd almost forgotten they were fighting. 'Nothing, I just — we need to talk about what you're going to do. It's an elimination date, remember?'

'Oh fuck,' James scrubbed a hand over his face. 'I forgot about that.'

'Yeah,' Lily dropped a hand onto her hip. 'So what are you thinking? Do I need to text Mary and have her send another town car or are we going to be driving Ms Darby back to her hotel?'

James shot her a look. 'Do you have to be like that?'

Now she remembered they were fighting.

'Like what?'

'Like — I don't know, like you hate her?'

Lily scoffed. 'I don't hate her and I'm not _being_ like anything. Just — are you keeping her or not? I'd like to get a move on if we're not.'

James frowned at her for a minute and Lily saw a million different replies flash across his face before he finally sighed and decided to take the path of least resistance.

'It's just not there for me with her,' he said, and he didn't look Lily in the eye and _god_ she was glad because she had no idea what her face looked like. 'It should be there at this stage, you know?'

Lily pulled her mobile from her back pocket and used it as an excuse not to look up. 'Uh-huh.'

 _Lily Evans: send another car to Toner's_

 _Mary MacDonald: yikes — sending now x_

 _Lily Evans: thanks x_

She expected James to be gone, so when she started to walk back out into the crowd — her eyes still trained on her screen — she nearly walked into him.

'Shit,' Lily pressed a hand against his chest to steady herself and then immediately snatched it back like she'd been burned. 'I — sorry, I thought you were gone.'

James shook his head. 'Still here.'

'I see that.'

They were quiet for a beat. Lily heard the announcer call out another name and the audience started applauding as whoever it was got up from their table and started towards the stage.

'I guess I should go back there,' he said.

Lily nodded. 'Probably.'

Neither of them moved.

'Lily, I — nevermind.' He turned to walk away and Lily reached out, took his elbow.

'What?' She moved so she was standing in front of him. 'James, what?'

He shook his head slowly. 'It's nothing. I've got to get back to Sarah. She'll be waiting for me.'

There were a million things that Lily wanted to say just then. That she didn't care about Sarah. That she was sorry. That she thought they could find an empty broom cupboard if they tried hard enough.

But instead of saying any of those things, she just nodded slowly and stepped out of James' way so that he could walk past her back into the crowd.

Lily's mobile buzzed in her hand and the bright light of the screen dazzled her after the darkness backstage.

 _Mary MacDonald: car should be there now. Ready when you are_

Lily took a deep breath and replied — _we've just got to get through the rest of these stories and then I can get the hell out of here_

She knew that, realistically, it wasn't really that long, but now that she knew how the evening was going to end, it really seemed like it was dragging along, this date did.

The story-reading portion of the evening concluded, James and Sarah had another round of beers (which they were allowed to drink) and dinner was served (which they were not allowed to eat) and they sat around chatting for the better part of an hour before James finally worked up the courage to do what he had to do.

They'd just hit a lull in the conversation that neither of them seemed able to fill when James cleared his throat and shifted nervously in his seat.

'Sarah, I — I'm sure you know that this date is an elimination date.'

He looked down at his lap for a moment, pulled in a deep, slow breath. When he looked up again, his eyes found Lily's first.

It was automatic. He corrected himself almost immediately, but that — the impulse —

He flicked his gaze back to Sarah's and a frown creased his forehead. 'Sarah, I'm sorry, but — I won't be asking you to stay this week.'

Lily saw Sarah's shoulders go rigid immediately. She was quiet for a minute before she sat up a bit taller in her chair and squared her shoulders.

'Can I ask why?'

James had clearly been hoping that this would just be over already, but he cleared his throat, nodded, and Lily could tell, even from this distance, that he was racking his brains for something that wasn't going to make the fact that he'd just dumped her worse than it already was.

'I just — we're getting down to the wire and I can only keep women that I feel like I have a really genuine connection with. And you're great, but —'

'We don't have a connection? How — you don't feel the connection between us?' Sarah's brow furrowed as she gestured between her and James.

James shook his head. 'No, Sarah, I don't.'

And then Sarah started to cry.

Loudly.

Some of the extras' reactions — god, Peter was going to love it when he saw some of their faces on the tape.

'Sarah,' James reached out and rested his hand on hers on the table. He looked like he was in agony. 'Sarah, I'm sorry.'

'Oh, you're sorry?' She looked up and glared so intensely at him that Lily thought James might catch fire. 'Sorry doesn't really make a difference to me, James. Sorry doesn't make you go back in time and decide not to break up with me.'

'I — Sarah, I just — the chemistry.'

'Whatever.' Sarah shot up from the table, threw her napkin onto her plate, and started storming out of the pub. James sat there for a moment, stock still, before Lily jumped into the shot and nudged him in the shoulder.

'James, go. Follow her out!'

He sat still a moment longer before he sighed, got to his feet, and shouted, 'Sarah! Sarah, come on!'

By the time he got outside, though, Sarah was already halfway down the street.

James stood on the pavement outside the pub and watched as Sarah marched off towards her town car just down the road, Marc and her cameraman following her closely. Lily could just make out Marc's voice as they walked away, rambling off questions to try and get Sarah to react, to get something, _anything_ that might be usable.

'Sarah, were you expecting the date to end this way? What did you expect coming into tonight? How do you feel right now?'

Lily sucked in a deep breath and, without turning to look at James, started up the road towards James' car and climbed in.

She settled herself in her seat, ran her hands over her thighs to smooth out invisible wrinkles in the fabric, and when the car door opened again, Lily turned to face the window so that she didn't have to watch James climb inside.

She could see the blinking red of Benjy's camera light reflected in the window, could feel the tension that had settled in the air between them. She could also see James watching her, could feel his eyes on the back of her neck, but she refused to turn around, refused to look at him and open something back up that she was desperately trying to keep closed.

This could only end one possible way and she wasn't — she couldn't let it get there. Not again.

Benjy was the first one out of the car when they arrived at the hotel.

Being alone, even for that brief moment in time, was enough to set Lily's heart racing. She took a deep breath and looked up at him.

'I'm going to get out and shut the door behind me. Give us a moment then climb out and head right through the hotel.' Lily didn't wait for James to reply — she just slid across the seat and scrambled out onto the pavement.

Benjy gave her a look as she shut door behind her. 'I need a shower.'

Lily frowned at him. 'What?'

'The way he was looking at you in there?' Benjy braced one hand against the camera and fanned himself with the other. 'Damn girl.'

Lily scoffed at him as playfully as she could muster and rapped on one of the side windows to let James know he was good to get out. 'Fuck off, Fen.'

Luckily, James climbed out of the car before Benjy had time to reply.

They packed themselves into the lift up to the penthouse, no one speaking as they moved slowly towards the fourth floor. James strode out into the corridor the moment the lift opened, started digging in his back pocket for the keycard to his room while Benjy and Lily followed behind him at a distance.

He swiped the card, walked inside, and the door fell shut behind all of them.

They'd set up an interview space before they'd left (another chair out on another balcony), so James walked outside and settled himself in the chair while Lily threaded the power cord for the lights into the hotel room and plugged them in. She and Benjy adjusted the light for a few minutes — lighting was never one of Lily's strong suits, but she felt better knowing that Benjy had a good eye for it — before they had the right balance of brightness (to see James' face) and darkness (to see the city lights spread out behind him).

'So, James,' Lily said as she sat down in the chair beside Benjy's camera. 'What did you think about the date tonight?'

They batted questions back and forth for about a half an hour — James was so much better at knowing what she was looking for now when she was asking him questions that she rarely needed to elaborate or ask for more detail. He supplied it from the off and it made both their lives so much easier.

When they'd finished, she and James walked back into the penthouse while Benjy started packing up the camera equipment and bringing it inside. She walked over, leant up against one of the arm chairs in the lounge area, and did her best to keep from looking James in the eye.

Regardless of whether or not she was looking at him, though, she could feel him looking at her.

The weight of his gaze, and their silence, was pressing on her the longer she stood there. She wanted desperately to look up, but she knew that if she did — if she saw the look on his face —

She was going to be sunk. Fucking sunk.

And she'd come this far.

Benjy set the last heavy bag on the floor inside and slid the balcony door shut.

'Phew,' he wiped at his brow, a broad smile on his face. 'That shit is fucking heavy.'

'Do you want some help carrying it out?' Lily asked. She pushed up off the chair and Benjy's eyes flicked rapidly between her and James.

'Nah, Lils,' he shook his head at her as he grabbed a bag off the floor and gave her an easy smile as he hitched it over his shoulder. 'I got it.'

'Are you sure?' Lily took a few steps closer to the sliding glass door and Benjy shook his head again.

'Really,' he said. 'It's alright.'

Benjy started towards the door and Lily hesitated for a long moment before she turned on her heel to follow him. And then, finally, James spoke and Lily froze.

'Evans.'

She should just keep going. Finish crossing the room and open the door. She shouldn't turn around, should pretend like she didn't hear him or —

She shouldn't turn around.

But she could feel the heat of his gaze on her back and she was frozen beneath it. She just stood there, staring at the deep grooves in the wooden floor while half of her was urging her feet to move and the other half was begging her to drop it, for once, to hear what he has to say and to let him in just a little bit because when she was being honest, something that happened so rarely these days, she couldn't deny that she wanted this. Him.

She turned around.

 _Fuck._

He — the _look_ in his eyes.

She couldn't ignore him when he was looking at her like that. She didn't want to.

She cleared her throat, pulled her eyes from his, and looked to Benjy.

'Fen — '

Benjy was nodding before Lily could even finish her sentence and Lily watched as the red light on the camera clicked off. 'I already got the interview, so, you know, I think it's fine. I'll just — '

He tipped his head towards the door and Lily nodded, stepped to the side of the room so that Benjy had room to walk past her.

The sound of the door shutting behind Benjy settled like lead in her stomach.

She pulled in a sharp breath, did her best to tip her chin up, square her shoulders.

'You wanted to talk about something?'

James' shoulders fell forward and he reached up, scrubbed a hand over his face. It was like he was crumbling in front of her and though the sight was almost too much to bear, she couldn't — the alternative —

'Lily,' he pinched the bridge of his nose, pulled in a long breath before he looked at her again. 'Lily, I'm done.'

'What?' This was not where she imagined this conversation going. 'What do you mean you're done?'

'I — I can't do this.'

'Do _what?_ '

'This!' He gestured forcefully between them, a frown carved onto his face. 'I can't do _this,_ Lily. I can't — this _show._ I'm done. I'm fucking done.'

Lily started shaking her head. 'No, James. No. You — you can't be done. We're almost done filming for fucks' sake! James, you — you signed a contract!'

'I don't care. I can't — I don't have feelings for any of these women and it's just — it's not right.'

'I —' She sighed heavily and ran a hand through her hair. 'We've been over this.'

James nodded forcefully. 'And we're going to keep going over this because I don't think that you're hearing me when I'm telling you that I've finished with this.'

'Of course I fucking hear you. You keep shouting about it!'

'Because I need you to understand that I can't keep doing this! I can't do this to them, Lily. To Liza and Claire and Summer and — I can't do this to them! They're amazing women and all that I'm thinking about —' James raked a hand through his hair and started pacing short paths along the end of the bed.

He turned hard on his heel after a few passes and looked at her.

'Lily, you know how I feel. Just — tell me where your head's at. Because if you say that you're over it, that this doesn't mean anything to you, that the last two weeks we've gone without speaking have effectively cured you of whatever attraction you fucking had for me — Lily, if you can say that, I'll drop it. I'll — I'll refocus and I'll figure out a way to deal with this so that I can see what develops between me and… whoever. But if you feel anything like I feel —' He touched a hand to his chest and took a step closer to her.

'Evans, if you feel even an ounce of what I feel for you, I've gotta know.'

The escape was right there. All she had to do was tell him that she didn't feel the same way. That her feelings for him had burned themselves up. That hot and bright and intense as they were, they hadn't lasted long.

It was right there.

'James, I —' She looked down at her feet for a moment, bit the inside of her lip. When her eyes found his, he looked more nervous than she'd ever seen him.

'Of course I still have feelings for you, James. _Of course_ I do. But —' She held up her hand because James had started closing the space between them and she wasn't done. She needed to get the rest of this out because he wasn't going to like where this was going and she wasn't going to be able to get there if he came any closer.

'James, the fact that I _desperately_ want to be with you doesn't change the reality of the situation we're in. And I know you think I'm being ridiculous,' she raised her voice a touch because James had opened his mouth like he was going to protest, 'and maybe Liza and Summer and them get hurt either way we do this, but — I shouldn't have kissed you in the car that day in Barcelona. I shouldn't've let us get as close as we did. I shouldn't've done a million things that I did with you, things I wanted to do because you — you're _amazing_. But it's not right, not to do it like this. You _know_ it's not. No matter what we feel for each other, it's not right to start something in the middle of this.'

James took a deep breath and closed his eyes for a moment like he was trying to steady himself.

'So tell me again why getting out of it isn't our best option. Tell me why you care more about my lawyers having work to do than you do about us having a shot.'

She sighed heavily. 'James, do you really think that we'll have anything even _resembling_ a normal relationship if _this_ is how it starts? In the middle of tabloid scrutiny and lawsuits and unemployment and drama? You think _that_ is a strong start to any relationship we might want to build?'

James peeled his glasses off and pressed his fingers into the bridge of his nose.

'I know you don't like to hear it, James,' her voice softened and, before she thought better of it, she stepped closer to him. They were still a few feet away, but she could touch him if she reached out her hand. She could wind her fingers in the hair at the base of his neck, take two steps forward and she'd be flush against him.

'I know you don't like to hear it, but this is why we started ignoring each other. Because every time we come back to this conversation and every time it comes back to this. There's no answer, no path that we're both willing to take.'

James slid his glasses back onto his face and when he opened his eyes and looked at her, he looked so unbearably miserable that Lily wanted to take it all back.

'So what are we saying?'

His voice was rough and deep and Lily could practically feel it scraping across her skin.

She took a deep breath, summoned the last bit of courage she had.

'What we've always been saying — there isn't anything between us and there isn't going to be.'

* * *

 **See you next week!**


	32. Chapter 31

**Hey friends! Note for chapters moving forward - a tumblr anon asked that I bracket off the smutty bits in the upcoming chapters with some x's, so when you see xxx in the text, just ignore it unless it's there for you.**

 **Enjoy! x**

* * *

The next week was the most complicated of the entire shoot.

It helped, having that to concentrate on.

It distracted Lily from the otherwise crippling sadness she was carrying around in her chest.

They hadn't fought about anything new, her and James — it was the same old song and fucking dance — but there was something about the way the argument had unfolded last night, something about the feeling of it. It felt heavier, like a ball of lead tied to her heart and weighing her down.

She just needed to get through a few more weeks. A few more weeks and then she could go home and buy every flavour of ice cream at Tesco and curl up on the sofa and watch John Cleese films until her body ached from laughter. It wouldn't fix anything — it never fixed anything — but it would be nice to feel something other than sadness or frustration.

Despite the events of the night before, James managed the Dublin ceremony with an energy that, honestly, she should stop being surprised by. Everything he did was always suffused with a warm, easy grace, an open air. The exhaustion was clear on his face, the sadness evident as the night progressed and he lost the energy to maintain the façade, but Lily didn't think any of the contestants noticed. If they did, they probably just assumed it was emotion tied up in sending Rachel home at the end of the night.

They wrapped the ceremony around midnight that night — everyone was keen to get as much sleep as they could before the madness of the next week started to unfold. They didn't have too much to plan, just some final details to hammer out, because Mary had been booking flights and arranging hometown dates for the last two weeks to make sure they could slide right into filming without having to delay production while they sorted everything out.

They had a few dozen plane tickets and a couple of hotel reservations to cancel for the places they now weren't going, but the hassle of cancelling everything was a million times better than having to scramble an organise everything at the last minute.

Especially now that they were going to America.

Bloody Summer.

She was an absolute fucking delight, but goddamn had she messed with Lily's hometown schedule.

All the alternate schedules with UK-based finalists had James jumping between locations every two days — he would have been exhausted, but they'd agreed (back in May before James knew any better) that it would be better to have an accelerated timeline than to build in rest time.

Anyway, rest time meant more production dollars down the drain and Lily was not going to listen to Peter bitch about it any more than she already had to.

Now that they were using the schedule with the trans-Atlantic flight built in and the five hour time change... there was going to have to be some rest time and Peter was just going to have to deal with it.

They'd thrown Summer onto the first flight out the next morning (an absolutely awful six o'clock flight that had her at the airport the minute it opened), but Lily had a few more hours before she and James were due to leave.

James got to spend those hours sleeping. Lily sat in her hotel room with Mary banging away on their laptops until she realised it was time to leave and she threw everything into her bag in a fit and darted down the hall to James' room.

She might have been nervous about seeing him alone again if she'd had more than two seconds to breathe.

She knocked hard on James' door as she pulled out her copy of his key card and swiped in.

'Fuck,' he was just sitting up in bed when she walked in, a panicked look on his face, 'fuck, I slept through my alarm.'

Lily froze halfway through the door.

His room was a wreck.

He wasn't much better.

 _Fuck._

'James!' She shut the door behind her and started grabbing clothes off the floor as she walked into the room. 'What the fuck?! Why didn't you pack when we got in last night?! We wrapped early!'

'I know, I know.' He jumped out of bed and started helping Lily gather his things.

'No,' Lily grabbed the things out of his hands, threw them over towards his suitcase on the other side of the room, and pushed him towards the bathroom. 'Shower. Go.'

'I want to help,' James said, his feet skidding over the hardwood as she continued to push him across the room.

'You're helping me by showering! Just _go_!'

James conceded, if only because he realised that arguing with her when she was like this was not going to be a productive use of either of the time. He grabbed a few random pieces of clothing from the top of his dressing table and walked quickly across the room into the bathroom.

They finished roughly simultaneously — Lily was just zipping up his case when James came stumbling out of the bathroom pulling a t shirt over his head. His hair was sopping wet — Lily watched as drops of water rolled down his neck — but he was dressed and packed and so Lily didn't care in the slightest that he was definitely going to look a bit a mess when his hair finally dried.

She extended the handle on his case and slid it across the room towards him as she made her way to the door.

'Perfect timing. Let's go.'

They only _just_ made it onto the plane.

They seemed to come to some kind of agreement that morning in the mad rush to get to the airport — they weren't going to ice each other out (their usual tactic for dealing with their drama), but they were going to be polite and civil and maintain a healthy distance.

It was almost worse than being iced out sometimes, but Lily would take what she could get.

It made her feel all that much more pathetic, that.

They were exhausted the entire time they were in Florida with Summer — the five hour time difference made them want to do everything at all the wrong times. They were both completely knackered by five in the afternoon and starving at the weirdest times. Even going to meet Summer's dolphins didn't really help make them feel better.

Though Lily did have quite a laugh when Summer told James to "put his mouth on the dolphin's mouth", so that was something. And they ended up in America over the Fourth of July, so they got to see a firework display. Small highlights, it was true, but it was a nice distraction from the vast emptiness in her gut that she couldn't seem to shake and the exhaustion threatening to pull her down all the time. She started to wish, about halfway through Summer and James' date at the aquarium where she worked, that she was one of those people that could just kip anywhere. It wouldn't have been her best idea, passing out cold in the middle of a date she was supposed to be paying attention to, but she was so tired that it was almost impossible to care. The inevitable confrontation with Peter would absolutely be worth another hour's sleep.

They met Summer's parents on their third day in the States, and they were exactly what Lily expected them to be based on the type of person they'd raised. They were both bright, happy people who made you feel welcome the moment you stepped into their home, and they talked _constantly_ about how proud they were of their daughter and her success.

'We don't have any scientists in the family,' Summer's father Sam told James over dinner. 'We were so proud of our little sunshine when she went to that big ol' school and got that fancy degree. And you should see her with those dolphins, James, did you see the way she's got them trained?'

'I did, sir,' James smiled at Summer before he looked back at Sam. 'It's really impressive.'

Summer's parents loved James the moment they saw him — Deb, Summer's mum, kept smiling and laughing at all his stupid jokes, and she watched the James and Summer closely when they sat out on the back patio together in the evening and chatted quietly. She looked at the two of them with a certainty in her eyes that made Lily's chest ache.

Though, it was true — and she couldn't deny it after seeing him here — James and Summer could be very happy together.

They flew to Aberdeen Wednesday morning and they took what time they could to catch up on their sleep before they were due to meet Amelia at the theatre for their date the next afternoon. It wasn't quite enough time to adjust to the rapid time change and Lily knew they'd be feeling it before the week was out, but they'd woken up at a somewhat respectable time Thursday morning and so she was confident that, with a little luck, they might find GMT a bit easier to adjust to than Eastern Standard Time.

James _was_ noticeably more well-rested when he and Amelia went to see a production of _The Wedding Singer_ at His Majesty's Theatre (Lily had laughed out loud at that when she got the note from Cara about what Amelia had decided on for their date) the next afternoon. The darkness under his eyes finally seemed to have ebbed a bit, and Lily was hopeful that his new-found energy would carry on through the rest of the day (especially now that they were back on their rapid-fire, two days per contestant schedule), but when they went back to her house that evening to have dinner with her parents….

Lily hoped that it was just because they were feeling a bit awkward in front of the camera.

Amelia's father kept shooting James the weirdest looks and her mother — Lily still couldn't believe it — her mother kept talking about Amelia's ex-boyfriend, "lovely Michael". She brought him up at every opportunity — she saw him in Lidl ('he was looking very fit, darling'), she heard from his mother that he'd gotten a promotion at the firm and he was doing 'quite well for himself down there in Edinburgh'. Poor James was a good sport through most of it, but even Amelia could tell that he was starting to get fed up with it by the end of the evening.

Liza's visit — Lily might have said _thank god,_ but underneath her relief, she was definitely getting heart palpitations.

James and Liza went to her school the afternoon after he arrived and played football against her school team — it was James and Liza against a dozen or so Year Sixes, and it was the cutest damn thing Lily had ever seen in her life.

One of the kids, Maisie, had stomped over to James when he first arrived (head to toe in his old Chelsea kit), hands on her hips, and told him that 'Chelsea was rubbish' and she 'couldn't believe he'd shown up in Leeds wearing that'.

And then Maisie absolutely handed James his arse and she started shouting at him for taking it easy on her.

'That kid'll go pro,' James whispered to Liza as they crowded around the benches post-match for water and snacks.

Liza nodded, stepped closer into James side, and wrapped her arm around his waist.

All the kids immediately started screaming, and James and Liza broke away laughing.

There was something different about the way James was with Liza — maybe Lily noticed it more because it was such a stark contrast from the way he'd been a few days before with Amelia. They were easy together — they laughed, laughed a lot, and they just... they fit together.

His arm moved automatically around her shoulders as they walked down the street to her dad's house. She sat close to him, their thighs touching, on the couch.

There was a softness to him when he looked at her, a warmth.

And Lily had a hard time believing that that wasn't entirely genuine.

Liza's father seemed just as taken with him as Liza was — James got the standard stern talking to out in the back garden, but he spent most of James' visit teasing him about football and telling him stories about Liza that made her flush and beg him to stop talking.

By the time they got off the train in London late Friday evening, James' energy had finally started to run out.

'I don't know if I can do any more of this,' he said as they pulled their bags through King's Cross. 'I'm going to die of exhaustion.'

'You will not,' Lily said. 'You're just hungry.'

James groaned loudly enough that the people on the escalator in front of them actually looked round.

Lily nudged him in the ribs and, for a moment, it almost felt normal, the smile on her lips and the teasing tone in her voice. 'Stop drawing attention to yourself, you dramatic arse.'

James grinned at her and it was almost normal, but then they stepped out onto the street and whatever had been there fell away.

His date with Claire the next afternoon was easily the most subdued James had had that week, but Lily was surprised — she and James both were — at how much he'd enjoyed himself.

Claire had been fairly reserved throughout filming, hadn't made too much of herself or really been in the centre of much, and she was easily the one that, going in, James probably knew the least about in terms of how they'd get on.

Their relationship paled in comparison to the ones he had with Liza and Summer, but the makings of something good were there. Claire just seemed like it took her a while longer to open up.

When they went to go meet Claire's family, Lily sensed this was something of an inherited trait.

Still, they'd made it through without much to complain about, and, before they knew it, it was Tuesday evening and they were standing in another hotel ballroom.

'How am I supposed to eliminate someone after this?' They were standing just outside the ballroom door, and James kept adjusting his tie and buttoning and unbuttoning his suit jacket. Lily wanted to reach out, take his hands in hers, and still them because the ceaseless motion was driving her mad, but she knew that that probably wasn't the best course of action.

Still, she couldn't resist entirely.

'James,' she reached out and rested a hand on his forearm. It was the slightest bit of pressure, but James' hands stilled immediately and he looked up at her. 'You had _no_ trouble deciding who had to go home this week. I know that it's going to be hard, but, really, it's for the best.'

James still didn't look convinced.

'There's no sense keeping her around if you know you aren't going to click. Not when you have better relationships with other people.'

Something shifted in his eyes and Lily dropped her hand.

'Are you ready to go?'

He pulled in another slow, deep breath before he nodded.

'Yeah, I'm ready to go.'

Everyone, absolutely everyone, was running on empty tonight, so the mix and mingle was, thankfully, kept relatively short. They got a few shots of James talking with each contestant and a few of the contestants talking together before they cleared the centre of the room, lined everyone up, and prepared for James to make his speech.

'I had a wonderful time getting to meet your families this week,' James said. He smiled out at everyone and Lily couldn't help but notice the way that his eyes lingered just a bit longer over Summer and Liza in the centre.

'It was so amazing getting to see where you're all from and to learn more about you from the people that know you best. I hope your families know what an honour it was to be welcomed into their homes and that they aren't too upset that I've dragged you all back to London for this.'

Everyone chuckled quietly and James looked down at the glass of champagne in his hand.

'But, unfortunately,' he turned and set the glass down on the pedestal beside him and the tension in the room noticeably shifted, 'I can't take all of you to Paris with me next week.

'This is the hardest decision that I've had to make so far and, before we get started, I want you all to know that I think you're absolutely amazing people — anyone would be lucky to have you in their lives. So with that said —'

He paused, took a deep breath before his eyes met Liza's.

'Liza, will you join me in Paris next week?'

Liza nodded, a bright, beautiful smile spreading across her face. 'I'd be honoured.'

She dropped a kiss onto James' cheek as she passed and James dipped his head for a moment before he looked up again.

'Summer, will you join me in Paris next week?'

Summer beamed and practically skipped across the room before she threw her arms around James' neck. They both laughed before Summer planted a kiss on the corner of James' mouth and she pulled back, her fingers grazing the hair at the base of his neck.

'That's a yes, by the way.'

James laughed, and Summer took her place behind him next to Liza.

The room became impossibly still.

James looked down at his hands again, Claire and Amelia were both standing stock still, clearly terrified on the other side of the room — even the crew was holding its breath as they waited for James to read out the final name.

James looked up and his eyes found Claire.

Amelia immediately burst into tears.

* * *

 **I am going to post another chapter today, but I need to eat lunch and finish up a few things first. So see you back here in a bit. x**


	33. Chapter 32

**Happy Sunday (again)!**

* * *

By the time they arrived in Paris late Wednesday afternoon, James and Lily were both completely exhausted. The stress of the ceremony the night before and the near constant travel had finally combined to push their exhaustion to a nearly intolerable point.

But at least they were in Paris.

'If I never see another aeroplane again,' James said with an exhausted sigh as he fell back onto the bed in his hotel room, 'it'll be too soon.'

Lily laughed and leaned up against the chest of drawers opposite the bed. 'I know what you mean.'

They'd managed to recover something of an easier relationship over the course of the last week. It had been awkward at first, especially in the immediate aftermath of their conversation in Dublin, but the burst of insanity the morning they'd left for Florida seemed to have unstuck something between them and made it easier for them to work together. They weren't talking much, not compared to the near constant stream of babble that had been their standard for so long, but it wasn't the sick, toxic relationship it could've otherwise been, especially given that their last honest conversation with one another was what it was. They'd slowly gotten back to this place where they could laugh, joke around a bit, and though Lily was happy about it, she couldn't deny that it brought up some very uncomfortable feelings for her again.

It had been hard to bury the sadness she still carried around about the whole thing, but she'd made a valiant effort. Laughing with him, seeing him smile at something she'd said… it brought back some of the deep, twisting pain she thought she'd relegated to the back of her mind until they wrapped in a few weeks.

Still, this was better than the alternative.

They were quiet for a beat, exhaustion flooding through them. Lily closed her eyes for a moment and she could almost fall asleep right where she was standing. It would be so easy to just —

'Evans?'

Her heart stopped.

The last time he'd called her Evans had been in Dublin, she could still hear it if she let herself think about it — 'Evans, if you feel even an ounce of what I feel' —

She opened her eyes.

James was sitting up on the bed now, his legs dangling over the end facing her. They were only a few feet away from one another.

'Yeah?'

'Can I talk to you about something?'

Lily cleared her throat and shifted a bit against the chest of drawers. She hoped to god that she didn't look at nervous as she felt.

'Sure. What's up?'

'Am I a terrible person?'

Her breath fell out of her in a rush. 'What? James, no — why would you think that?'

'I just — Lily, I —' He propped his elbows up onto his knees, rested his chin on his hands, and looked at her.

He was exhausted, they both were, but he was looking at her like he hadn't in a long time and now, alone in his hotel room…

'I should get going,' she said.

James cleared his throat, nodded jerkily. 'I should be getting to bed anyway, I guess.'

'Yeah,' Lily nodded, 'we both should.'

Lily didn't move.

One, two minutes ticked by and then James shifted on the bed, sat up a bit straighter. His movement, so unexpected after sitting still for so long, made Lily jump, and she pushed up off the dresser and strode quickly from the room. She didn't know what he was doing, but she was determined not to look back.

Despite the fact that she could feel things starting to shift between her and James again, Lily slept like an absolute _rock_ that night. She was out the moment her head hit the pillow and she didn't wake up until her alarm went off at noon the next day.

Once she was awake, though, she found that her thoughts about James were much harder to avoid.

She texted Mary to finalise a few plans for the rest of the week, met Marlene for lunch and made sure that Mary had something delivered up to James' room for him to eat so that she didn't have to hear about how she was starving him. Through it all, she kept finding her mind wandering to the way that James had looked at her last night, caught herself trying to fill in the rest of the sentence that she hadn't let him say.

 _Lily, I —_

They'd been doing so well. They'd been doing so _amazingly_ well and one night, one broken fucking sentence, and Lily was tripping all over herself in her head again.

Where in the hell did her resolve go?

And why was she so certain, after the things she'd seen last week, that this was James trying to rekindle something with them? She'd had no other evidence of it, no lingering looks, no subtle touches. She had nothing else to go on but that sentence fragment and her apparently colourful imagination. Because that, last night, couldn't've been James letting her know that he was interested in falling back into this fucked up spiral with her. He was voicing something else, some guilt, probably about having to let go of these contestants now that they'd formed such strong attachments to him — that they'd formed such strong attachments to one another? — and nothing more. And she was determined, this time, not to be the one that stepped too close, to be the one that threw them back into the drama, because she literally could not take it anymore. She couldn't take the anxiety about getting caught, couldn't take the weight in her chest as she thought about dragging James back into something that she knew she couldn't finish.

She was determined not to be the one that took them back there.

She buried herself in work for the rest of the day and told herself that, as long as she wasn't thinking about it, it wasn't actually real.

* * *

'Are you telling me I actually get to _eat_ on this date?' James looked beside himself.

It was seven thirty the following evening and Lily was leaning up against his bathroom door frame while he straightened his tie in the mirror.

Lily shook her head at him, a playfully exasperated smile on her face. ' _Yes._ Peter decided that, because it was dark and no one would _really_ be watching you eat, that it was fine if you actually ate on this one.'

James pumped his first into the air as he turned and strode out of the bathroom towards the hotel door. 'Thank _god,_ because I could eat a fucking cow.'

She hung back a bit further than she might normally have on the date that night, partially because she needed the space to sort through what was going on in her head and partially because Dans le noir was dark as _hell_ and there was no way that she was going to be able to navigate that space without hurting herself or someone else. She sat in the room next door to the dark dining space with Jax and Rob, one of the cameramen, and watched James and Summer's date on the screen they'd had set up because it was impossible to really monitor the date in the dark.

James and Summer spent most of the time roaring with laughter as they fumbled around in the dark trying to find their cutlery and then their food. James kept stabbing his fork just to the right of his plate and every time they heard the solid thunk of the tines against the wood, Summer would laugh and chastise him for trying to eat like he'd never seen food before. It would have been a great distraction, all this nonsense, until Summer leaned across the table and kissed him.

Lily couldn't tell from the screen if James was kissing her back — she knew that Summer was leaning over the table for a fairly decent amount of time, knew that she was smiling at him as she pulled away.

She was all prepared to be worked up about it until she saw the look on James' face.

It was all green from the night vision and a bit fuzzy because the screen they were watching on wasn't the best, but there was no mistaking the frown on his face.

Lily didn't know who she was going to have to pay to make sure that didn't make it into the final cut of the show, but she was ready to sell a kidney to make sure she had enough to cover the bribe.

James and Summer laughed their way through the rest of the dinner. The entree, some kind of risotto, completely tripped them both up because of the consistency and then neither of them could figure out what they were eating for dessert and they kept guessing wilder and wilder things to freak the other person out. After they'd finished eating, James and Summer took a short walk through the street, talked a bit more. Summer took James' hand as they stepped out into the surprisingly cool night air, threaded her fingers through his, and their hands stayed that way as they walked.

He told her about his parents. His brother and his best friend. She told him about her older sister, her little nephew, all the plans she had for her future self.

It was remarkable how close they sounded.

They wrapped the shoot around eleven, largely because neither James nor Summer could stop yawning long enough to get a full sentence out and it was starting to drive Jax absolutely batty. James walked Summer back to her car, kissed her goodnight, and then he walked back to his own town car, head down, hands in his pockets, and slid into the back without looking at anyone.

The whole way, Lily turned the date over and over in her mind. She thought about the way they'd laughed, how easily they'd held hands, how he'd leant down and kissed her goodnight outside her car. She knew, too, that James had also frowned in the restaurant when Summer couldn't see, but that... it was possible that that hadn't been related to the fact that she'd just kissed him.

She thought about their date and she thought about his sentence — Lily, I — and by the time they'd gotten to his hotel room, she had worked herself up into such a state that she could practically feel herself teetering on the edge. Her throat was tight with emotion as the car pulled up — frustration at herself for going back to this jealous place, sadness at the evidence that James had moved on — but she was determined to do what she could to bury it to at least get through the night.

Lily and Benjy were silent as they followed James back up to his hotel room, didn't say a word as James crossed the room and sat down in the seat Benjy had set up earlier in the evening.

'So,' Lily said once James had stopped shifting around in his seat, 'how was your date tonight?'

James took a deep breath and smiled into the camera. 'It was great. Summer is — she's wonderful. I love talking to her.'

'You kissed a few times tonight,' Lily said, and she hoped that James couldn't hear the bitterness that she heard in her own voice.

'Yeah, we did.'

'Your relationship seems to have progressed pretty substantially over the last few weeks.'

James nodded slowly. 'It just took me a while to feel comfortable, I guess.' He was carefully weighing every word and his hesitancy was driving Lily mad. She wanted him to just come out and say it already, for him to tell her exactly where they stood.

'How would you describe your feelings for her? Summer? And how do they compare to your feelings for the other women?'

James shot her a look. 'Jesus christ, Lily. Why do we have to compare —'

'Just answer the question.' She knew that she sounded terrible, knew that this is what Lily from last year would have done — steamrolled over his feelings to try and get the answer she was after — but she couldn't —

She just needed to get out of there.

She needed to get this diary and then she needed to get out of there.

'I —' James raked a hand through his hair. 'Summer's lovely. I like her a lot.'

'Do you love her?' Lily wasn't sure how she meant to sound — maybe swift, unfeeling. Maybe like she cared about the answer and wanted him to say yes. However she meant to sound, she was sure that she didn't want to sound the way she did. Sad. Hurt. Vulnerable.

'I —' James broke off, dropped his head so he was looking at his hands, and was quiet for a long time.

He eventually looked up, his eyes finding Lily's first before they darted back to the camera, but he didn't finish his sentence.

'Alright,' Benjy sighed heavily from beside them and shut the camera off. He pointed at James and then at his chest to indicate that he should take the wire off, and James reached back, started rustling under his suit jacket.

'You two,' Benjy said when James pulled the mic out of the back of his trousers, 'need to have a conversation. Because the tension in here is killing me.'

'Fen —' Lily started, but Benjy shook his head at her.

'Not a chance,' Benjy started breaking down his camera equipment, shooting them looks every few moments to make sure they were still listening. 'If you're not going to quit the show, James, at least come up with some kind of plan for afterwards. Because, and maybe this makes me a collossal arsehole, but let's be real here — you haven't looked at one of these fucking contestants the way you look at Lily. So if you have to pick someone and then let it fall apart after the show, then, whatever, do that, but you two need to sort your shit out because even I'm tired of the two of you not being together.'

Benjy scooped up the tripod in his free arm and carried it into the room. Lily and James followed.

Benjy leant his tripod up against the wall, grabbed his camera case, and started shoving the camera inside. 'I'm leaving,' he said. 'You two can do… whatever you're going to do, but please _god_ just talk about this. I know,' he looked at Lily, 'I know that you don't want to talk about _plans_ or any of that shit, but Lily just — be a little more than your usually repressed self, alright?'

Lily crossed her arms and glared at him. Benjy just smiled.

'You'll have to glare harder than that, love. Remember who I'm married to.'

Lily's eyes darted over to where James was leaning up against the dressing table before she looked at Benjy again.

'I — I don't —'

Benjy smiled at her. 'I'll see you tomorrow, Lil.'

Then he grabbed his bag from the ground and stared across the room.

Benjy pulled the door shut behind him and the click of the door in the lock made Lily's heart climb into her throat. She watched her shoes as she shifted her weight between her feet before she cleared her throat.

'Okay, so, shoot starts tomorrow at ten —'

'Lily.'

'— we've got to be out by nine at the latest, maybe a bit earlier with traffic —'

' _Evans._ '

She huffed, dropped her hands onto her hips, and finally looked up at him. 'What?'

'Are you going to talk to me?'

'I'm talking to you right now.'

James sighed. 'Lily —'

'Alright. Sorry.'

They stood silently facing one another for a moment before James pulled in another breath and ran his hand through his hair.

'You're not going to start this are you?'

Lily's reply — "I don't know what I'm supposed to be starting" — was right on the tip of her tongue, but they'd already sniped at one another enough and maybe adding fuel to the fire wasn't the best plan of action.

She went with, 'I don't know where to start,' instead. It was honest and she didn't see how he could possibly be annoyed with her about that.

'How about the fact that I just spent a week and a half with these other women. And their families. I spent almost a bloody fortnight with them and the whole time all I could think about was you.'

He couldn't mean that. He — she'd _seen_ him on his date tonight. The night before, with Claire... that had been one thing, but this date? With Summer? He couldn't have faked that. 'James — I — tonight. With Summer.'

'What about it?'

She swallowed hard and looked up at the ceiling for a moment. She didn't want to open up to this, didn't want to have to tell him just how anxious this whole thing made her, didn't want to let him in and tell him about everything that had quietly been driving her insane since she'd started paying attention to it all again. She didn't want to voice it because voicing it made it real. Voicing it, and voicing it to him, meant that it might actually _be_ real.

'That can't have been fake, James.' It was all she could say, but luckily she didn't need to say anything else.

James sighed heavily. 'Lily, I — Summer _is_ lovely. But...' He shook his head like he couldn't believe he was having to explain this. 'I can't get you out my head. I've tried again and again and again, and — Lily you are… you're —'

He was silent for a long moment and even though she knew she shouldn't, there was an earnestness about him, about what he'd said, that she believed. James was a shit liar, she'd have seen it on his face immediately if he was having her on, but the way he was looking at her right now...

It was absolutely genuine and the realisation settled heavy in her gut.

She sighed. 'I don't know what you want me to say.'

'I just want you to tell me how you _feel_.' He raked a frustrated hand through his hair. 'I'm guessing all the time about where your head's at and it's driving me mad. You're either there, flirting and chatting and doing all that, or you're gone. Completely gone. There's no in between and I don't know how to tell when you're going to be one or the other and I can't _think_ straight —'

'I —' James fell silent the moment Lily'd started talking, and she immediately regretted it because she had no idea what she wanted to say. 'I — the contract —'

'Oh, not this again.'

'Just _listen_.'

James crossed his arms. 'I listen plenty. It's all we ever talk about, that bloody contract.'

' _James._ '

'Alright. Fine.'

She paused, took a deep breath to try and get her bearings back.

'I know you hate talking about the contract, but — I can't stop thinking about it. Every time I think I'm going to let myself relax and just _enjoy_ being with you the way I want to be, I remember that it exists and that you're on this fucking _show_ and — every time I let myself think about you the way I think about you, I feel insanely guilty. Because I'm not supposed to feel this way about you. I'm not supposed to be in this. It's not fair.'

As she'd been speaking, James' arms had slowly uncrossed and fallen back to his sides. He pressed his fingers to his forehead and started rubbing out the creases, and Lily's voice broke.

She cleared her throat, straightened her shoulders.

'I want to know how we can do this. I _want_ to do this. I — what I said in Dublin about how I wanted to be with you? James, I meant that, no matter what else I said. I just — I don't know how it happens. I don't see how we get there when it's like this.'

His fingers stayed on his forehead for a minute, and Lily watched him, the knots in her gut tying themselves tighter and tighter until it was almost impossible to breathe.

And then he looked up at her and her breath fell out of her in a rush.

Where Barcelona had been quick, impulsive, this moment felt like it was a long time coming. Lily felt like they were standing in the eye of the hurricane — she knew that there was hell waiting on either side, but right now, in this moment?

Right now, all she wanted was for James to be as close to her as she could get him.

And honestly? Fuck that contract. This was so much bigger than a contract.

He didn't step closer to her like he normally would have done, he didn't move, but the heat in his eyes, the way he was looking at her — it was like a magnet pulling Lily across the room.

She took a few small steps closer to him and was hovering on the edge of more when he spoke.

'Lily — we — we still don't have a way out of this.'

She took another step closer.

'I know.'

'But you — you want this?' His voice was low, rough, and it grated over her skin. 'Like I want this?'

Another step.

'That depends.' She tilted her head and smirked just a bit. 'How do you want it?'

He swallowed hard and pulled in a sharp breath. He took a second to run his eyes over her, his eyes lingering over the curve of her hips, the long line of her legs before they met hers again.

'I want everything with you.'

Lily took a small step forward.

'Everything?'

James nodded. 'Everything. And I don't know how we get there either, but I don't — Lily, I don't care —'

Lily didn't wait for the rest of his sentence. She didn't need to hear it.

She closed the space between them, took his face in her hands, and pulled his mouth to hers.

xxx

They groaned as their lips met, and James moved his hands to the small of her back, pressed Lily up against him. Everything else, _everything_ else fell away when they were together like this, when he was running his tongue along her bottom lip and slipping his hands up the back of her shirt and she could shift against him and he'd moan quietly into her mouth. Everything else fell away and all she could think about was feeling James' skin against hers, about getting as close to him as she could and pressing her lips to every part of him.

James pulled his lips from hers, started dotting kisses along her jaw, down the side of her neck.

'Are you going to leave again?' His breath was hot against her skin and his voice was shaking a bit as he spoke, but he pressed a kiss to her pulse point and Lily leaned into him. 'I can't handle it if you run away again. I won't do that again.'

She wanted to tell him the truth. She wanted to tell him that she didn't know, that everything was up in the air — between the contract and her ever-increasing insecurities about the remaining women and James' relationships with them —

She wanted to tell him that she was scared, that she watched him with Liza or Summer and found it hard to believe that he felt the way he said he did. That the idea of calling this whole thing off now, when so much time and money had been funnelled into this project, was horrifying to her, but the dark, jealous part of her wanted to do just that so that she didn't have to worry about Liza and Summer anymore. She wanted to tell him, and she probably should've done, that sometimes her guilt over what they were doing, being together and getting... serious —

Sometimes the guilt over what they were doing weighed so heavily on her that she couldn't breathe.

But now, right now, she didn't want to talk about any of that. Right now, she wanted to let it all fall away in the feel of James' lips moving against hers, of his body under her hands, and so Lily just tipped her head back as James pressed another kiss to her neck and gave him the answer she knew he wanted and she desperately wanted to be true.

'I'm not going anywhere.'

James groaned against her neck, he turned his head, and his lips found hers again.

There was something wholly different about this moment — the kiss in Barcelona had been hot and passionate and full of longing, but this, right now… there was a depth to this kiss that made Lily weak in the knees.

She wanted him, every single piece of him.

And even though, somewhere on the edges of her consciousness, she knew that this wasn't going to last, right then, she didn't care.

All she could think about was James' hand sliding up the side of her shirt and her hands on his back and his muscles shifting under her hands as she kissed him.

She stepped into him, once, twice, until he got the hint and started walking them backwards towards the bed. He huffed quietly against her lips when the backs of his thighs hit the mattress and Lily pulled away, laughing, and started peppering kisses along his jaw.

He sat down on the bed, spread his knees, and pulled Lily into him.

She could feel him, hard, pressing against her stomach, and she took his jaw in her hands and kissed him again.

The urgency increased two, three-fold.

James pulled her shirt up and Lily stripped it off, dropped it onto the floor behind her while James unhooked her bra and slid it down over her arms. Her hands loosened his tie before she tugged it over his head, knocking his glasses, and they both laughed as Lily adjusted them before she moved her hands back between them and started unbuttoning his shirt.

It took her forever — the buttons were impossibly tiny and James had started kissing her collarbone and then he brought one hand up and pinched her nipple, and — she could _not_ fucking concentrate when he was doing that.

James ran his tongue up her neck and nipped gently at her pulsepoint — Lily moaned and her hands tripped over the button she was still trying to undo.

'Fuck, James,' she was breathing hard and she felt him smile against her neck. 'I can't get this fucking shirt off.'

James grazed his teeth down her neck before he leaned away, reached back and pulled his shirt over his head.

Lily promptly stopped breathing.

She'd forgotten he fucking looked like this.

She watched as she ran her hands over him, as her fingers dipped into the grooves his muscles cut into his skin. She traced her fingertips over the waistband of his trousers, just lightly enough that she could barely feel his skin, and he groaned, leaned forward, and kissed her again.

Lily smiled against his lips as she popped the button on his trousers.

She took him by the elbows, stepped back, and pulled him to standing. His trousers slipped a bit lower on his hips as he stood and Lily moved her hands, slid them slowly down his ribs until she could hook her fingers around the waistband.

She leaned back so that she could look him in the eye. 'Can I take your pants off, too?'

James nodded jerkily and Lily grinned before she popped up onto her toes and pressed a quick kiss to his lips.

Then she sank down to her knees and pulled his pants and trousers slowly down his legs.

James was panting watching her.

When the fabric pooled around his feet, Lily pushed up onto her toes, intending to press a teasing kiss to the cut in his hips, but James grabbed her by the elbows, pulled her back to her feet, and kissed her again with such urgency it made it impossible for her to breathe.

His hands ghosted up and down the length of her body — he brushed his fingers along her collarbone, pinched her nipple, traced his nails lightly down her ribs — he undid the button on her jeans without her even realising, and Lily laughed into his mouth when James slid his hands down the sides and started tugging them down.

'How did you even do that?'

James just grinned at her as he spun them, pushed her back onto the bed. 'If I say "lots of practise", will that make me sound like a ho?'

Her jeans fell to the floor.

Lily laughed. 'A little, but that's alright. We were all hoes once.'

James put his hands on her hips and, still laughing, kissed her again.

Now, naked, Lily thought they might hit a fever pitch, but when James' lips found hers this time, they were slow and deliberate. He caught her bottom lip lightly between his teeth as he spread his fingers out over her ribs, and when Lily moaned and lifted herself up off the bed to meet him, James followed her up.

She wrapped her hand around the back of his neck and pulled him with her as she started to slide back across the duvet. His knees hit the side of the bed as he was clambering up after her, and they laughed at his awkwardness, James dropping kisses across her — her stomach, her forearm, her shoulder — before he was hovering over her and his mouth was on hers.

The feeling of his weight pressing down on her — it went straight to her head and she wanted more, as much as he could give her. She wrapped her leg around his waist and pulled him harder against her and James lifted himself up onto his hands.

'I don't want to crush you.'

She pulled him back down again and took his face in her hands. 'Crush me. Please.'

She wanted to be surrounded. Wanted everything else in the world to disappear until it was just her and James and his body pressing her into the mattress and making her mad with want.

He only consented for a moment before he pulled away again, this time moving even further and starting down her body. She grasped at his shoulders and was planning to pull him back up, but then he took one of her nipples in his mouth and all thought fell out of her head.

She arched into him and James smirked against her as he moved one of his hands to her thigh.

'This alright?' He brushed his fingers along her inner thigh.

She moaned and wove her fingers through James' hair. 'Yes.'

He kissed her chest, her neck, and then brushed his fingers against her, and the flurry of sensation —

'Fuck,' James pressed his forehead against her collarbone for a moment before he tilted his head and kissed her neck. 'You're so wet.'

She half moaned, half replied, and neither was really intelligible, but James didn't seem to mind. He just moved his fingers lightly over her clit and made her do it again.

He pulled back after a moment and looked at her, their breath coming in waves.

'Can I go down on you?'

Lily moaned her assent and James pressed his lips to hers for a moment before he pulled back and settled between her thighs.

She thought he might get right to it, desperate as he sounded, but he started by pressing slow, soft kisses along the inside of her thighs. She must have made an impatient sound, because James chuckled and looked up at her.

'Patience, Evans.' He leaned forward and pressed a kiss to her stomach, her hip, the top of her thigh. 'We've got all night.'

Lily sat up onto her elbows and glared at him. James just laughed, pushed lightly on her stomach until she laid back down, and pressed another kiss against her skin. The stubble on his jaw brushed against her and she shivered.

'James.' She arched her hips towards him and he laughed as he took her hip in his hand and pressed it down into the bed.

'You're so impatient,' he said. His voice was so quiet she could barely hear him over the sound of her own breath. She just felt his breath, hot against her skin, and she moaned again, shifted closer.

'You're going to kill me, that's why I'm impatient.'

James lifted himself up so he was hovering over her again. He shifted his weight to one arm and cupped her cheek with his free hand.

'Evans,' he brushed his lips against hers and Lily felt herself melt into his hands. 'Relax.'

He smiled against her lips and slowly started kissing his way back down again.

She half expected him to kiss her thighs again, to make her wait, but then he laid his arm down over her hips and ran his tongue up the length of her and Lily nearly came undone.

'Fuck,' she reached down and wound her fingers in James' hair as he flicked his tongue over her clit. 'Fuck, fuck, fu —'

He ran the flat of his tongue over her and she was completely senseless after that.

He switched it up every few minutes to see what she liked, varied the pressure, the way he moved his tongue against her — when he found something that made her moan, like the slow, sweeping drag of his tongue over her clit, he brought it back round when she was least expecting it and every time it pushed her even closer to the edge.

'James.' He hummed against her and she gasped.

'James — I need —'

He dragged his tongue slowly over her again and Lily moaned loudly, pressed her head back into the pillow.

'What do you need, love?'

'I —'

Fuck, she couldn't _think_ when he was doing that.

'Fingers.'

James hummed against her again and then he curled one, two fingers inside her, and someone was going to hear her, but oh _god_ she didn't care.

The tension in her gut was tied so tight and she could barely breathe and he was driving her mad, actually mad, because for the rest of her life all she was going to think about was his fingers curved inside her and his tongue on her clit and nothing, _nothing_ was ever going to be better than this — he ran his tongue slowly over her again and the tension snapped.

He held her hips in place as she trembled under him, just kept moving his mouth slowly over her as she came down. Lily grabbed his shoulders and pulled him until he was hovering over her again, leaned up and crashed her lips against his. James' hand curved around her waist and Lily groaned, pressed herself closer to him.

'James,' she kissed his neck, his chest, 'please _god_ tell me you have a condom.'

'I should —' he paused, took a breath to try and even out his breathing. 'In my bag. My wallet. I should have one —'

Lily rolled out from under him and shot him a look over her shoulder as she crossed the room. 'Is it still in date?'

He nodded. 'Yeah. I — it's not that old, I —'

'You get laid, James,' Lily said, rolling her eyes at him despite the smile tugging at her lips, 'we get it.'

She dug around in his bag until she found his small leather wallet at the bottom. She opened it up and started digging around in the pockets. 'Where — oh,' she found it behind a frequent customer card for some frozen yoghurt place.

She looked up at him and smirked. 'You have a frozen yoghurt card?'

James shot her a look. 'Evans.'

She dropped the wallet on the ground and practically ran back to the bed.

'What's your favourite flavour of frozen yoghurt?' She tore open the packet and looked up at him as she pulled the condom out.

James grinned at her, but the cheekiness to his expression fell away when she took him in her hand and starting rolling the condom on.

She took his face in her hands when she finished, pulled him back with her as she laid back down. 'Come on,' she kissed his jaw, 'I want to know your favourite flavour.'

James bit down softly on her chin and then ran his tongue over the spot. 'Tart.'

Lily laughed, but then James was inside her and she couldn't think about anything else other than the fact that he felt so _fucking_ good.

'Fuck,' James stilled, pressed his forehead to hers before he leaned down and caught her lips with his. 'Lily — _fuck_.'

He moved slowly at first.

He moved so slowly it was almost unbearable, the way she could feel every single inch of him, and no matter how much she begged him to go faster, he set a slow, even pace because he could see what the steady roll of his hips against hers was doing to her.

She was all tied up in knots again and she could barely breathe and then he lifted one of her legs and he hit something in her that felt like it set fires in her blood.

She disrupted his rhythm a bit when she pulled him down to her and kissed him, but he found it again soon enough and it was more than worth it.

He picked up the pace a bit then, his hips moving harder and faster against hers, and she couldn't — she —

'James — _more_.'

He set her leg back down on the bed, wrapped his arm firmly around her waist, and lifted her hips up higher and the change in the angle sent shockwaves through her.

He was going to kill her. This was going to kill her and she honestly couldn't think of a better way to go.

He was hitting some part of her that Lily didn't even know existed and she was about to start begging him to do this with her all day every day when he moved one hand from her hips and reached between them and started rubbing out small circles on her clit.

And then she broke.

James held her hips as she came, moved three, four more times inside her before he groaned and his grip tightened on her waist.

He held her there for a moment and, when the arm supporting her back stopped trembling, he lowered her slowly back down onto the mattress. She ran her hands up his arms, over his shoulders, before she threaded her fingers in the hair at the base of his neck and pulled his mouth to hers.

The kiss was slow and soft and tender and it was everything.

James rolled off of her, took a moment to catch his breath before he pushed up, pressed a lingering kiss to her lips as he climbed out of bed, and walked off to the bathroom.

xxx

Lily watched him walk away before she let her head fall back into the pillow. She had a wide, silly smile on her face and she pressed her hands to her face.

'God,' she laughed softly, shook her head. She took one more moment to giggle to herself before she sat up and waited for James to vacate the bathroom.

Lily smiled at him and hopped off the end of the bed when he walked back out of the bathroom. 'My turn!'

James laughed and swatted at her bum as she slid past him and shut the door.

She looked at herself in the mirror the moment the door closed behind her. Her hair was an absolute wreck from having James' hands in it, her cheeks were flushed bright red, but her eyes were shining brighter than they had in weeks and she was smiling in a way that almost made her look like someone else.

She might very well be paying for this night later, but right now? Right now she couldn't find it within herself to regret what they'd just done.

She went to the bathroom, washed her hands, and ran a washcloth over her face so that she could at least pretend she'd done something to her skin before she clicked off the light and walked back out into the room.

Her eyes had adjusted to the bright bathroom light in the few minutes she'd been in there, and it was hard to see in the dark room. She heard the blankets shift from the bed and then James said, 'Come to bed.'

James turned onto his side when Lily climbed back into bed. He reached his arms out, pulled her into his chest, and even though she knew she should leave, go back to her own room, it would take an army to drag her out of this bed tonight.

She leaned forward and pressed a kiss to the underside of his jaw, James sighed and buried his face in her hair, and then Lily closed her eyes and drifted off to sleep.

* * *

 **see you next week, my friends x**


	34. Chapter 33

**This chapter is going to feel so short after that _giant_ last chapter. But next week we're back in London for the finale! Who's excitedddddd**

 **Also can I just take a moment to say thank you to everyone that has taken time to leave a comment (or multiple comments like omg) on this story? You have no idea how much each and every one of those comments mean to me. I've been in a difficult place with writing over the last few weeks (such is life) and it has really meant a lot to see feedback from you all about something that I've written (especially something that I struggled to write and something that I still, sometimes, struggle to edit). So thank you all from the bottom of my heart.**

 **Enjoy, my friends x**

* * *

Lily woke early the next morning to the warmth of the sun on her face.

The sun was pouring in through the window, and though there was a bit of noise floating up from the street, Lily knew it had to be early because it was nowhere near as loud as she knew it could be.

She opened her eyes.

James was lying on his side facing her, and though he was on his own pillow, his face was only a few inches from her own. One of his calves was resting on top of hers, and their hands were barely touching on the bed in the space between them.

She'd never seen him look this easy, this comfortable. This bloody adorable.

His long eyelashes looked like they could almost touch his cheek bones, his lips were parted just a touch, and the normally hard lines of his face, his jaw, his cheekbones, were softened in sleep. His hair — half of it smashed underneath his head, the other half flopping up towards the head of the bed — was going to be a complete disaster when he sat up, and Lily felt the smile overwhelm her face.

It was phenomenal, what she felt for him. Staggering.

Even though she knew, in the back of her head, that this wasn't going to be able to continue with them just now, she couldn't carry on pretending that she didn't feel this way when she looked at him. That her heart didn't swell in her chest and make it hard for her to breath in the best possible way.

She knew she should leave, knew they had a full day ahead of them, a day when they'd be thrust back into the reality of their situation and this bubble they'd created for themselves would be swiftly and soundly burst. She knew they couldn't carry on with this, not at the moment, but she was, finally, going to allow herself a few minutes to just revel in the enormity of the things she felt for him.

They were terrifying feelings, if she was honest. And they were terrifying for all sorts of reasons. The main reasons were obvious — she and James were who they were and their situation was what it was and she was so afraid of being able to walk the incredibly thin line she needed to walk to make this work that, more often than not, she ended up toeing the line before turning tail and running in the complete opposite direction. She knew that wasn't fair, showing up and disappearing and going back and forth, but she sometimes wondered if it really would have been fairer to stay, if it would have been fairer to subject him to the constant stress and anxiety and lashing out that her brain would be doing as she attempted to maintain her balance in the totally ham-fisted way her brain always seemed to balance emotional things.

Running away was, she told herself, the kinder option. But she also knew that that was, probably, just what she was telling herself.

Because James would want to hear about all those things going on in her mind, would want to talk about them with her and support her through them, because that was just the kind of person that James was. He was wonderful to a fault — it was one of the things, especially lately, that she'd come to really love about him — and though that understanding started to chip away at the walls she'd built around herself, it didn't dismantle them entirely.

And there was still so much about this, her decisions about their relationship and her job and everything else, that he didn't know. And she could tell him, he would listen, but dragging it all back up — she wasn't ready for that.

Even thinking about going back and remembering it, living it again —

But that, maybe, was where the rest of her terror about James sat. It sat in the fact that she wanted — as much as she ever wanted to sit down and do such things — to talk to him about those things. She wanted, despite all her usual ways of going about life, to tell him about those things that scared her. Those things that she didn't talk about. She wanted to tell him because she wanted him to understand her, she wanted him to know everything he could possibly know about her, and she, in turn, wanted to know everything that she could possibly know about him.

She wanted to know him inside out. She wanted to know what made him tick.

And, for her, getting to know James could be something that she could pass off as an experiment, a human interest type of thing, even though she knew that that absolutely wasn't what it was. But reckoning with just how much she wanted him to have of her… that was something that terrified her in a way that she couldn't even begin to describe.

All she knew was that she wanted it. She wanted him to see her. Understand her. And the immensity of that feeling, the one that made her feel like she didn't want to leave this bed, leave _him_ ever again… it was like nothing she had ever felt before in her entire life.

And while part of her found the newness of that feeling exciting, the reserved, emotionally defunct part of her saw all of that as a reason to pull back.

But she couldn't tell — and the distinction seemed important — if it was James she wanted to pull back from or if it was just the situation they were in.

She suspected she knew which one it was.

She'd been watching him sleep for a few minutes, her own breath synchronising with the slight rise and fall of James' chest, when he shifted his head a bit on the pillow and his eyes opened.

Lily's first inclination was the shut her eyes and pretend she hadn't been watching him, but James smiled the moment his eyes found hers and she knew she'd already been caught.

James hummed and let his eyes fall closed again as he reached his arm out and wrapped it around her waist. He slid towards her, buried his face in her neck, and whispered, 'Good morning,' into her skin.

Lily shivered and pressed closer to him, reached up and wound her fingers through the hair at the base of his neck. She felt him, a little hard, against her stomach, and she breathed a soft chuckle into his hair. 'Good morning.'

James huffed and tightened his hold on her waist. 'Don't make fun of me. I can't help it.'

Lily leaned her head back and pressed a kiss to his cheek, then another to the corner of his mouth. 'I'm not making fun of you.'

James curled back into her and pressed his nose into her neck. 'Now you're lying to me.'

She laughed then, her laughter shaking both of them, and she felt James smile. He spread his hand out over her back, started trailing his fingers lightly over her skin.

She could lay there like that forever. But now that he was awake and they were talking and she could see the look in his eyes….

She wasn't regretting it — she couldn't, _wouldn't_ regret it — but she was starting to think that perhaps a bit of distance — especially because today was going to be —

'I should get going.' Lily slid her leg from between James' and moved her arm so it was resting between them again. 'I shouldn't've even stayed over — what if someone had come by?'

James' fingers flexed against her back and he slid his calf back over hers. 'You're the only one that stops by.'

She knew he was right, but, now that she'd let it in, given it voice, she couldn't help the anxiety starting to creep up into her throat.

'Benjy —'

'Knows about us,' James said. He pulled back so he could look at her and frowned at the look on her face. 'Stay.'

She sighed, but, and she was sure that James noticed, she didn't pull away. 'James —'

' _Stay_. _Please_. Evans —' He moved his hand from her hip, cupped her cheek, and wove his fingers through her hair.

And that alone —

That alone told her all she needed to know just now. She could feel the anxiety easing out of her, like the brush of his fingers against her skin was literally drawing it out of her, and the tension starting building immediately in her stomach.

She was sure that the anxiety was still there in the back of her mind, but she couldn't hear it, couldn't feel it clawing at her throat. Right now, all she could think about was his hands in her hair and his words against her skin.

She wound her legs tighter through his, pulled herself across the mattress until she was pressed up against him again. His hand moved from her hair to her back again, and the feeling of his fingers pressing into her skin —

She felt electric.

He leaned forward, pressed his lips to the hollow of her throat. She hummed and pulled him closer.

'Lily,' he ran his tongue up the column of her neck, kissed the shell of her ear, 'I don't want you to leave. I don't _ever_ want you to leave.'

She wasn't even interested in leaving anymore — she knew James knew it, too, because he was now brushing his lips lightly underneath her ear and, with every pass of his lips, she was pressing herself closer to him — but she needed to at least make one last attempt at something resembling an interest in their schedule for the day.

'The shoot —'

'Is in a few hours. What else do we have to be doing until then? Hmm?' He pressed his lips to her pulse point.

She pulled back then, just a touch, just far enough that she could look him in the eye.

'I guess you're right.'

James barely had time to smile before she kissed him.

She could still feel the nerves lurking on the edges of her consciousness the rest of the time they were in Paris — like she was waiting for Peter to burst into her hotel room and tell her she was fired or for Liza to point at her while she was following James around on their date that afternoon and say that she knew she and James had fucked the night before — but, overwhelmingly, Lily found herself worrying far more about what her relationship with James _was_ now that they'd finally cleared a few hurdles and she'd allowed herself to relax into her feelings a little bit.

Maybe they hadn't talked about any of the emotional things, but there had to be something to be said for clearing the physical ones. And she'd certainly done more thinking on the emotional front than she had done before.

It was a dangerous line of thinking, the idea that physical change between them meant anything overly significant, and she knew it, but she couldn't help indulging in it, especially when James snuck glances at her whenever he had a spare moment. The moments were fewer and further between now that he was on one-on-one dates with the finalists, but he still found them.

It only made Lily feel a little guilty every time.

The trouble with small amounts, though, is that they tend to add up.

By Sunday night, ceremony night, the guilt pressing on Lily's chest was almost too much to bear. She'd spent the last three days watching Liza and Summer and Claire look at James like he was the goddamn sun in the sky. They laughed at his jokes, found excuses to touch him — they beamed whenever he was around and Lily knew what that felt like. She knew the way that James got under your skin, knew how he made you feel warm and light and happy and like nothing else in the world mattered. She knew how that felt and watching them, the contestants, feel it?

On top of her own all-consuming guilt, Lily also found herself, still, quietly obsessing over the way that James acted when he was with the other women.

The way he leaned in when they kissed him. The way his hands found theirs easily as they walked. The way he laughed with them.

She was sure that the contestants were going through something similar — this obsessive concern about where they stood and what their relationship was and how it compared to the relationship James had with the others — but the trouble was that Lily wasn't _supposed_ to be having any of these issues.

She wasn't supposed to be part of this. Wasn't supposed to care. And, while she was busy worrying about everyone else, they didn't know that they had to worry about her.

She did her best to bury everything, to smile at James like everything was alright, to sneak soft, quick kisses when she dropped him off at his room at night, but she didn't stay after that first night and she didn't make any extra effort to be alone.

If James sensed that she was starting to go distant again, he didn't say anything. And thank god, because half of Lily was already too busy shouting at herself for pulling back just when they'd managed to solve a few things and how could she honestly continue to be this fucking stupid? Was she really so stunted that she couldn't have an honest, open conversation with him about things? After all they'd been through? After all she'd already put him through?

But really, other than having had sex now (and having let herself admit a few things to herself that she still hadn't dared voice aloud), had they really changed the situation that they were in? Was there really anything to be gained from having another conversation where Lily basically said "you signed a contract please just carry on we have one more week left" and James got grumpy and distant again? But did she even have the right to decide what was to be gained and what wasn't? Did it even matter? Didn't she owe him this fucking conversation anyway, no matter _what_ might happen?

She was already piling on herself so much in her own head. She didn't need to add James to that equation, too.

The ceremony that night was set on the rooftop bar and lounge on top of their hotel, so Lily waited until the absolute last minute before she left her hotel room and walked down the hall to go get James.

He was fiddling nervously with his cufflinks when she walked in.

'You ready?' She smiled and hoped that she didn't sound as stiff as she thought she did.

James shook his head. 'I want to talk to you first.'

She pulled in a sharp breath. 'James, we — we really don't have time to talk, we're due to be upstairs in —'

'Please, Lily,' he crossed the room and, when she didn't move away, put his hands on her hips, 'this'll just take a second. I promise.'

Lily couldn't think of anything to say, so she just nodded.

James took a deep breath and his fingers twitched on her hips.

'Is it —' he swallowed hard and Lily's heart started hammering anxiously in her chest. 'Is it too late? To back out? I — I know we've talked about this before, but Lily, I — I love —'

Lily shook her head at him and James fell immediately silent.

He —

Oh god.

He couldn't.

Not like this. There was no way that he — he couldn't.

'James,' Lily took a slow step back and James' hands fell from her hips. 'Yeah, it's too late. It was too late nine weeks ago when we started shooting. I — we've been _over_ this —'

'I know.' James stepped back and started pacing slowly in front of her. 'I know. But I thought — the other night — I don't know what I thought.'

He raked a hand through his hair and was quiet for a minute, the soft scuff of his dress shoes against the carpet the only sound in the room.

'I thought,' he said, turning to face her, 'that maybe something between us might have finally changed. That maybe you'd realised that I mean it when I say that I can't go through with this. That what I feel for you… it's… Lily, it's —'

He looked down at his shoes and Lily had never hated herself more than she did in that moment.

 _She_ was doing this to him. She was taking his heart in her hands and she was fucking breaking it.

'What Benjy said the other day,' she was grasping at straws and she knew it, but she needed to give him something because she couldn't keep looking at him like that. 'Why don't you do that?'

James quirked an eyebrow at her. 'What did Benjy say?'

'To just pick someone at the end and then break up off camera. Would that be so terrible? These relationships almost never work out anyway — look at last year's Eligible bachelor. Look at the American show!'

'I — Lily, I don't want to get someone's hopes up. I don't want them thinking that I'm going to give our relationship a fair shot and them immediately turn round and say, "thanks for this, love, but I'm actually going to go be with my producer, now".'

'I just don't see what other choice we have.'

James looked at her for a long moment and Lily saw something like resolve settle in his eyes. 'What would you do if I went up to Peter's office right now and told him I was out?'

Lily's heart stopped.

'You better not.' Her tone was cold and hard, but James crossed his arms and raised his eyebrows at her, clearly bracing himself for the inevitable fight.

'Why not?'

Lily pressed her lips together to keep from snapping at him, took a deep, slow breath. Shouting at him was not going to get him to so what she wanted — it was only going to piss him off and send him off to do god knows what and get them both into trouble.

She wasn't a producer for nothing, though.

'James,' she softened her voice even more than she normally would have because she was still so angry that she was sure he would hear it in her tone. 'There are three women upstairs who are falling in love with you. And you can't just pull the rug out from under them like that. They'll be crushed. And that's not the kind of guy you are — we both know that.'

She felt sick and more than a little dirty for doing it, but sometimes, you needed to do what you needed to do to get your star on set.

James groaned and buried his hands in his hair.

'That's,' his hands fell heavily by his sides, 'Lily, that's _not_ fair.'

She shook her head. 'None of this is fair, James. But it is what it is.'

His eyes were hard when he looked back up at her and, though Lily wanted to take it back, to apologise, to find a way out together, she pushed down the impulse.

'Are you ready?' she asked instead.

It took him a moment but, finally, he nodded slowly before he turned on his heel and strode towards the door.

* * *

 **See you next Sunday xx**


	35. Chapter 34

**Happy Sunday my friends x**

* * *

If you'd asked Lily a few weeks ago how she would feel when she finally got back to London at the end of production, she would probably have said that she'd be thrilled.

Exhausted and overworked and ready for a break, but, nevertheless, thrilled.

That couldn't have been further from the truth as she got off the plane at Heathrow early Monday afternoon.

She and James hadn't spoken much since the ceremony the night before. It was a reaction she expected, especially after she'd snapped at him the way she did, and it such a familiar song and dance at this point that it almost didn't bother her.

She really should have been more worried that she'd eventually push him over the edge.

They were only scheduled to film two days while they were in London — two more days and then they were free, blissfully free, to do whatever they wanted with their lives (outside of getting caught out by the paps and having the show's conclusion leaked before air) until the live reunion show was shot in early November.

This time last year, Lily had been beside herself with excitement.

Today, she was sitting in James' hotel room with James and Benjy, going over the schedule for the next two days and trying not to throw up.

'The representative from Mappin and Webb is due to be here in an hour,' Lily said. 'You'll talk about rings and cuts and whatever else,' she waved her hand, 'that entails, and Benjy and I will get some diary shots of you talking about who you're planning to propose to without actually getting the name. We can cut it if you mess up, but we'll want this first bit to be vague.'

James had been looking down at his hands for the last few minutes and didn't look up when Lily paused. He just nodded mutely.

'Then we're going to head out and get some transitional shots — you in the park, walking around, that sort of thing. We'll probably get some of you here in the hotel, too, looking at the ring, staring dramatically off the balcony, you know.'

Lily tried to laugh, but James still didn't look up.

She cleared her throat. 'After that, you'll come back here and eat dinner. Tomorrow isn't going to be much for you until late afternoon — we'll spend the day getting the space ready in the observation deck and all that, but I'm only going to come fetch you when it's time to film your conversation with Marlene and then, of course, the, uh, engagement scene.'

She said it quickly and then carried on, hoped that James wouldn't notice that she'd almost choked on the words. 'After that, it'll just be some shots of the two of you together, separate diaries, nothing too difficult or involved.'

James nodded and Benjy shot Lily a look.

'Talk to him,' he mouthed.

Lily shook her head and Benjy threw up his hands.

Lily hadn't gone into any sort of detail about what exactly had gone on between her and James in Paris — she hadn't needed to say much, really, because Benjy seemed to have guessed and had started making himself scarce when Lily began lingering longer in his room at drop offs in the evening. She knew that Benjy was curious, especially now that things between them were distant again, a little chilly, but Lily just couldn't….

She couldn't talk about it. She just needed to put her head down and get through the next two days. She needed to be done with it.

Because nothing with James could change until these two days were up anyway. There was no point, _none,_ in hashing out the same conversation they'd now had a million times. Benjy'd given them a solution, a brilliant solution that Lily was now depending on, but James….

James didn't seem like he wanted to take that way out. And Lily couldn't force him either way and ultimately everything was up to him and maybe, despite it all, he'd decide that he was just tired of the struggle of their relationship. That the work and the difficulty and all that wasn't worth whatever he thought the payoff might be.

Maybe he'd just pick Liza or Summer and be done with it.

Or maybe he'd pick someone and break up with them and then he and Lily would sort it out.

She had no idea which way he would go — didn't even have a gut feeling about it — and so even though Lily knew that Benjy wanted to talk about it, knew that he wanted to give her the chance to siphon off some of the tension that was constantly building in her head, she just… she couldn't.

She just needed this to be over.

The appointment with Nigel from Mappin and Webb was, as Lily'd expected it would be, the worst four hours of her life.

Nigel on his own was insufferable — he'd walked in all 'I'm Nigel C Babbington the third, it's wonderful to make your acquaintance Mr Potter' in his top-hat-and-tails fucking accent — but couple that with the fact that she was sitting there watching James pick out engagement rings...

James, who she —

She spent most of the appointment exhaling hard and avoiding making eye contact with Benjy.

James didn't seem even remotely interested in the rings that Nigel was taking out of his pretentious little velvet-lined box and flashing around in front of him. He didn't perk up at the 'stunning diamond solitaires' or 'lovely three-diamond pieces', he had no opinion about yellow gold or white gold or platinum, and the fact that each ring was 'hand-set with scintillating diamonds' made absolutely no difference to him.

They kept having to re-shoot scenes because James would be looking down at his hands or making unenthusiastic, noncommittal sounds, and then he would huff and get all annoyed when they had to reset and do it all again. Lily snapped at him a few times — 'Well, if you would just look like a little excited, maybe we wouldn't have to keep fucking reshooting!' — but it only made him cross with her and then he shut down even more and it just wasn't fucking worth it.

James finally settled on a platinum ring with a one carat diamond solitaire and a diamond band that Nigel said was 'inspired by the Boscobel English rose' and the 'perfect marriage of romance and femininity'.

Nigel'd made a whole big show of selecting the tiny velvet box James would be presenting it in, but James, instead of fawning over it like Nigel apparently expected him to, just lifted it quickly from Nigel's outstretched hand and stuffed it into his pocket.

When Nigel finally left (after much blustering about shining the ring up nicely before opening the box on camera), they walked James out to Potters Fields Park (Benjy had laughed for a full minute when he'd suggested it and Lily gave in because they'd put him through so much and he deserved _something_ ) and sat him on one of the stone steps in the grass overlooking the Thames to film his diary. The sun was _just_ peeking out behind the clouds and so the city looked soft, a bit warm, though not so bright that it overwhelmed the scene. They positioned him just so so that you could see the bright blue lines that made up Tower Bridge, and the people milling around in the background were just enough to give the scene a bit of movement without it being too much.

It was going to be a lovely little shot.

James shifted uncomfortably as Benjy set up the camera.

'Alright,' Lily clapped her hands together and tried to smile. 'So you know what we're going to be doing here, right?'

James nodded.

'Okay, great. So, uh — do you know who you're going to choose yet or?'

James shook his head. 'I — have an idea, but I — I don't know.'

'Okay, okay,' Lily nodded. She sounded peppy, like a fucking cheerleader in one of those movies for teenagers, and she wanted to throw herself over the wall into the Thames and just be done with it. 'That's okay. We can just talk in vague, general terms.'

James raised his eyebrows at her. 'I thought you wanted me to do that anyway.'

'Well, yeah,' Lily laughed awkwardly. 'See, you're an expert.' She whipped around and saw that Benjy was done with the camera. 'Alright, let's get started.'

She walked back behind the camera so that she was out of the frame and took a deep breath.

'Why don't you tell us a bit more about the woman you're planning on choosing tomorrow?'

James looked down at his hands and was quiet — for a minute, Lily thought that he was shutting down again, that he wasn't going to answer, but then he looked up and there was a softness in his eyes that hadn't been there before.

'She's amazing,' he said, and there was no way that he was faking the warmth in his voice. 'Everytime that I'm around her, I feel… invincible. Like everything is right in the world, like we can just forget everything else exists because it's just us.'

A hard knot formed in Lily's throat the moment James began speaking and she swallowed hard against it. She nodded, gestured for more, and James continued.

'She's easily the most amazing person I've ever met. She's funny and beautiful and dead clever. She gives me a run for my money.' James breathed a laugh and he looked down at his hands again for a moment.

'Every minute I'm around her, even when things are tough or tense or whatever — every minute I'm around her is better than every single one I'm not.'

Lily pulled in a long, slow breath, braced her hand against her knee. 'That's — that's great. Okay, uhm, have you put any thought into what your lives would be like together?'

'Yeah. Loads, actually.'

Lily's stomach bottomed out.

She swallowed hard, funnelled all her energy into keeping her voice calm and even. She was not, under any circumstances, going to have a breakdown. Not now, not in front of all these bloody tourists. Not in front of James. 'Any details you want to share?'

The left corner of James' mouth twitched just a bit before he bit it to hide his smile.

'Uh, I don't know, uhm…. I think the clearest picture I have is the two of us waking up one morning, like a Sunday, and we've had a bit of a lie in…' his smile broke free then, and he was so unbearably beautiful that Lily's chest hurt.

'And we go downstairs and we're in our dressing gowns and she's teasing me about how my hair is a wreck or something and then — we just put the kettle on and we turn on the radio and stand at the cooktop and make porridge and — I know it's nothing exciting, but that's the stuff I think about most. Just being able to be together and just be _normal._

'So much about this is just… I mean, it's mad. It's so far from normal and… that's all I really want with her. I want to build something with her. I want to build a life.'

The more James talked, the larger the knot in Lily's throat grew until it was so large she didn't feel like she could breathe through it. Benjy looked at her at one point — she must have made some sort of sound — and frowned. 'You alright?'

She nodded jerkily. 'I'm fine.' She sucked in a sharp breath and looked up at the sky, blinked back the tears that were just starting to form in the corners of her eyes. She looked back down at James. 'Great,' her voice was rushed, short. 'Anything else you'd like to tell us?'

A slight crease formed between James' eyebrows and he shook his head.

Lily got increasingly short as they moved through their answers — when James talked about the diamond he'd picked and he reverted back to this closed off, cross, sad version of himself, she'd just about snapped.

'James! You were just all lovey dovey about whoever the fuck you're picking tomorrow! What is it about the _ring_ that's throwing you? Surely you can muster up some of that energy.'

James shot her a scathing look before he circled back and tried again. 'The ring is beautiful — she's gorgeous and so I wanted a ring that spoke to that.'

He had to do it a few more times to get the anger out of his voice, but they got there in the end.

By the time they got back up to James' room after shooting the transitional shots, they were both at the end of their respective ropes.

They'd spent the entire walk back quietly sniping at each other, Benjy had long since given up moderating (really, he was a much better friend than Lily could've asked because she would have given up ages ago), and they could barely even look at each other as they walked through the door of his hotel room.

James took the ring out of his pocket and set it down hard on the dressing table as Benjy shut the door behind him.

'We aren't staying.' Lily's tone was clipped and she heard Benjy sigh as he walked past her to gather up the filming things he'd left in the corner of James' room that afternoon. 'Benjy just has to get his filming things.'

James sank down onto the end of his bed and dropped his head into his hands. He was quiet for a long moment, and Lily looked down at her feet and watched as she shifted her weight from foot to foot. She was still angry — she could feel the fight simmering in her veins, could feel the words she'd snap at him on her tongue — but she was determined to keep her head. They were so close to being done with this, so close to getting out of here without having some big, stupid, explosive row —

'I'm sorry.'

Her head snapped up.

The look on James' face could've stopped a thousand hearts.

'Lily, I'm so sorry. I'm just — I'm tired and cross and I — my feelings for you haven't gone away no matter what I do, and tomorrow is —'

James looked at her for a moment, just a moment before he dropped his gaze, but the moment was enough.

James had never been good at hiding his emotions, at disguising them, and try as he might, the dark shadows under his eyes, the deep lines on his forehead, the impossibly sad look in his eyes….

He needed her. It was only a question of whether or not she was going to be there.

Lily turned to Benjy.

She opened her mouth to say something — she didn't know what — but Benjy shook his head. 'It's alright, Lil, I know the drill.' He smiled softly at them as he slung his bag over his shoulder, stepped forward to shake James' hand before he turned and pulled Lily into a brief hug.

'You two can still call it off you know,' he whispered into her hair, and Lily sucked in a sharp breath to ward off the tears burning in her eyes. She pulled back, smiled at Benjy, and hoped that the look on her face would tell him everything he needed to know.

'Thanks,' she said. It wasn't enough, was nowhere near enough to tell him exactly what she meant. It was thanks for being there, for listening, for pushing her, for giving her the space she needed when she needed it. Thanks for dealing with all the bullshit they'd put him through, for sitting through all those painfully awkward car rides.

It wasn't enough, but Benjy seemed to understand. He squeezed her forearms in a bracing sort of way and smiled softly at her before he released her and started across the room.

When Benjy pulled the door shut behind him, the tension in the room shifted. It settled heavily in her gut and she couldn't quite read it — was it anticipation or dread or —

James moved towards her and Lily immediately held up her hands.

He froze. 'What?'

'I,' Lily shifted her weight onto the balls of her feet. 'I shouldn't have — I should leave.' She spun around, looking for her bag and coat and all the fucking folders she'd brought in with her earlier, shook her head as she watched James fist a hand in his hair out of the corner of her eye.

'You don't have to leave.'

Her eyes snapped back to his, more because of his tone than anything else. She knew he _looked_ sad, knew that he'd pretty much stopped sleeping since the ceremony in Paris, hadn't seen him eat anything properly in about as long, but she hadn't ever heard him sound the way that he did just then, like every bit of energy and fight had been sapped out of him.

Still, even though her heart was begging her to stay, to take him in her arms, to call Peter and shout, 'Fuck the show, James and I are together and we're leaving,' the logical side of her was still winning out.

She shook her head. 'James, I,' she closed her eyes, pulled in a slow, steady breath. 'I _have_ to leave. This — James, tomorrow is — '

'I fucking know what tomorrow is, Lily,' James snapped. His tone was sharp now, a fire she hadn't expected burning in his eyes when he looked at her.

Her temper kicked to life before she could stop it, and she threw up her hands, her voice rising in volume. 'Then why the fuck are you acting like I can stay?!'

'Because,' James' voice matched hers in volume and ferocity, 'I would have thought you would want to help me come up with a plan!'

'Plan?!' She scoffed and watched a look of hurt flicker across James' face, 'There is no plan, there can't _be_ a plan because you're refusing to take the only way out that we've fucking come up with!'

James narrowed his eyes at her. 'You know bloody well why I can't do that.'

'Yeah, James, I've heard your _reasons_ ,' her tone was scathing and she knew he heard the the insecurity there. 'I just don't think you understand that that is literally our only way out!'

'That's only because you're so fucking stubborn and refuse to think of any reasonable way out of this!'

'You signed a contract,' Lily said, her voice dropping in volume and pitch as she tried to hammer home to finality of it all. 'There is _nothing_ that either of us can do about what has to happen tomorrow and —'

'Only because we let it get here!'

'Oh no,' she shook her head vigorously, took a few steps closer to him, hands on her hips, 'don't try to act like _we_ did this — '

'You're right,' James said, nodding, ' _we_ didn't do this, _you_ fucking did.'

Her eyebrows shot up. 'I did?!'

'Yes! You kept insisting that there was nothing we could do, no way out, that I had to fucking go through with it, that _our_ fucking feelings,' he gestured quickly between the two of them, 'didn't matter because I signed a fucking piece of PAPER.'

'Well they _don't,_ ' Lily was practically screaming now, and even though she knew that anyone walking by would be able to hear them, she also couldn't find it within herself to give a shit was she was this fucking angry. 'They don't fucking matter, James, not when every single lawyer that uTV has can bring lawsuits down onto your head because you decided to catch feelings for your fucking producer!'

'Oh, well thank _god_ you're looking out for my best interests here, Lily, I really wouldn't know what to do without you making sure everything was alright.' His tone was scathingly sarcastic and Lily rolled her eyes.

'Please, James, stop acting like I fucking made you do this — '

'No, you're right,' James said, nodding, 'I was a fucking idiot for agreeing to do this show — '

Lily shouted, 'Exactly,' but James just shook his head and talked over her, 'Because I fucking _knew_ from our first lunch meeting that this,' he gestured between them again, and even though his voice was still angry, the gesture was softer this time, 'was more than _anything_ I'd get out of this bloody show.'

Lily barely suppressed the impulse to roll her eyes again. 'Then why the fuck did you go through with it? If you honestly felt that way, which I doubt, why go through with the whole fucking series?!'

James had scoffed at her doubt, but now he just looked thoroughly exasperated. He shrugged. 'Fuck, I don't know. Because I'm a fucking idiot? Because I'd _signed a contract_ and everything was already in motion and I felt obligated to go through with it? Because Sirius had pushed me to do this and I didn't want to back out and have him think I was falling back into my post-football depression?! A million fucking reasons, Lily, none of them good!

'I regret so much about this whole thing,' he continued, 'how much — how much I've hurt Summer and Liza and everyone else on this bloody show. I hate that I was dating them, letting them think that they had a chance, when really, I couldn't stop thinking about you.'

She wasn't sure when the tenor had shifted from argument to confessional, wasn't sure how to feel now that James was looking at her like he was, now that he was closer and his tone was softer. They needed to get back to fighting. She wouldn't do something she'd definitely regret if they were fighting.

'I regret that we started like this, that I didn't get to date you properly, that every fucking piece of our relationship had to be some giant secret. I regret so much about this, but even if I could go back and decide not to sign that paper, I wouldn't do it. Because I got to go to that lunch and meet you and then I got to fall in love — '

'James,' she held up her hands again, and James fell silent. His forehead creased, and she knew how much this, _she,_ was hurting him, but she couldn't. She couldn't hear it and then watch him propose to someone else tomorrow. She knew it was true, she'd be an idiot not to know, the way he looked at her, but she couldn't hear it.

Hearing it was too final, too real, too much.

'The bridge,' she shook her head. 'Everything you said this afternoon by the bridge — you… you have to have feelings for one of them. You couldn't have made that up.'

'I didn't make it up.' He held her gaze, and even though Lily wanted to drop her gaze, to duck her head and run away, his gaze had her pinned where she stood.

'Lily, every single word was about you. You're who I want my Sunday mornings with. You're who I want teasing me about my hair. You're who I want to spend every single day with, to build a life with. I want to get out of this fucking mess and I want to put on the radio and drink tea and laugh and dance around the kitchen with you.'

Tears leaked from the corners of her eyes before she could stop them, and she reached up to wipe them hastily off her cheeks.

'Evans, just,' James stepped forward, watching her as he went to judge whether or not she was going to continue to push him away. When she didn't move, he took her hands in his, and Lily bit her lip to stop the sobs now threatening to work their way out of her, squeezed his hands just a bit tighter. 'Stay with me tonight. We don't have to talk about any of this, just — stay. Please.'

He was asking her, begging her, and even though the logical side of her knew that this was a terrible idea, knew that she absolutely should say no, knew that she wasn't doing either of them any favours, she stepped closer, rested her head on his chest, and nodded.

They'd already done so much damage. What was one more night?

James dipped his head down, buried his nose in her hair, pulled in a long, slow, shaky breath, and it was that, finally, that broke her.

She wrapped her arms around his waist, tried her best to muffle the sob that escaped in the fabric of his t shirt.

James pulled back, moved his hands to cup her cheeks, and even though she knew he didn't believe it, it eased pain in her stomach when he brushed her tears away and said, 'It's going to be alright, Evans.'

It wasn't and they both knew it.

But they weren't talking tonight.

xxx

She moved one hand from his waist to wind her fingers in the hair at the base of his neck, lifted herself up onto her toes, and pulled his mouth to hers.

His hands moved immediately from her face to her hair, his fingers threading through the strands in the way they always did when she was kissing him, and he stepped forward until their bodies were pressed together.

Their kisses were usually rushed, heated, full of roaming hands and frantic breathing, but this kiss was something wholly different. James' lips moved slowly, purposefully over her own, and though his hands were in her hair and then they were sliding over her, tracing down her neck, over the swell of her breasts, her waist, her hips, it was like he was memorising her, committing every bit of her to memory instead of trying to escalate things. Instead of lighting her up, instead of pushing her to the edge and making her desperate for more, for him, he was taking his time. He was weighing her curves and tracing angles and brushing his fingers, his palms, against every part of her that he could reach.

It hit her, then, as he moved his mouth to her neck and he started whispering words she couldn't catch into her skin. It hit her, what he was doing.

He was saying goodbye.

Lily felt more tears escape, but instead of pulling away, she pressed closer to him, let her body, her hands mimic James' slow, steady, almost reverent pace.

She let her hands run a bit slower up his sides as she stripped off his t shirt. Pressed a few more kisses across his chest. Let her fingers linger longer on the sensitive spots of him, the ones she knew drove him mad.

When they finally fell into bed, she pulled him over her, pressed him to her until there wasn't a breath of space between them. She wanted him to surround her, to fill up all the space between her and the rest of the world, for their bodies, together, to block out everything else, space, time, contracts, commitments, all of it, everything.

When they finished and James climbed back into bed beside her, they laid on their sides, foreheads pressed together in whispered conversation, his hands in her hair and hers on his chest. They didn't talk about anything in particular, she couldn't really even remember, but what they talked about then wasn't the point. It was the feeling, the bubble, the soft intimacy they'd created.

She wasn't sure when they drifted off, legs tangled, bodies still pressed together, silence wrapping around them, but the last thing she remembered was how warm he was against her and how soft his voice was in her ear and how, in that moment, she would have done anything to stop the sun coming up the next morning.

* * *

 **That wasn't really smutty, but I still wanted to mark it off just in case.**

 **And I reckon I might have time to edit another chapter today. It won't be for a while, but I think I want to post a second chapter so... stay tuned for a few hours. I have to go visit family etc etc but _later._** **See you then xx**


	36. Chapter 35

**Welcome back x**

* * *

On finale day, Lily woke up before the sun.

Not because she wanted to, but because her nerves literally would not let her sleep any longer.

Tempting as it was to do otherwise, she decided to use her obnoxiously early start to her advantage, mostly because she knew that things wouldn't end well for her if she allowed herself to stay in bed any longer. As it was, the temptation was overwhelming to reach up, brush the long strands of hair off of James' forehead, to run her thumb across his brow, his cheekbone, his jawline. She could almost see the look he'd have in his eyes when he opened them, could almost feel the way his fingers would press into her back when he pulled her against him, the way she'd press her mouth to his….

She untangled her legs from James', slid out from under his arm as gently as she could, and slipped out of bed. She probably should have woken him, said goodbye. Said something. She knew it was cowardly, leaving like that, but she just — she couldn't face him. She couldn't hear his scratchy, morning voice in her ear. Couldn't feel his fingers ghosting over her skin. She just couldn't.

She grabbed her clothes off the floor from where they'd dropped them the night before, pulled them on, and gathered her things in silence.

She took a long, hot shower when she got back to her room, washed the night before off her skin. She might have cried, just a bit, but everything blended in with the water and so it was easy to pretend that it wasn't happening. By the time she stepped out of the shower, she'd steeled herself for everything that was set to come.

It wasn't going to be easy and she was probably going to have a proper cry when it was all finally over, but she was going to get through this day.

She spent the next few hours burying herself in work.

She dipped down to the cafe a few floors below, grabbed a table in the corner and sat with her filming clipboard and a pot of tea for as long as she thought she could get away with. She went through filming schedules and all of James' final details. She read up on Liza and Summer's schedules, confirmed times with Marlene and Kate and Cara, read emails (and emails and _emails_ ). There was a lot going on today, there were a lot of points to meet and deadlines and they all needed to be hit perfectly.

She was thankful for the chaos of the day. She covered herself in it, in the timelines and the preparations and the things that could go wrong. The chaos allowed her to pretend that the day was the same as any other, almost made her forget that, in a few hours, James was going to tell another woman that he loved her enough to marry her.

And it stopped her thinking about James waking up in bed alone. Stopped her imagining the look he must have had on his face when he'd realised she'd gone.

That afternoon, Lily made her way back up to the 52nd floor and headed towards the hair and makeup room to check that Marlene was finished getting ready. Marlene was usually responsible for getting herself from one place to another (largely because she insisted that having Lily check up on her made it feel like they were colleagues instead of friends), but on finale day, Marlene was willing to let Lily's more overbearing tendencies slide, something that Lily was especially grateful for today.

Sure enough, Marlene was sitting in the makeup chair when Lily arrived, chatting merrily with Alice about some bloke she'd gone a date with a while back as Alice put the finishing touches on her hair.

'He was a sloppy kisser, though,' Marlene was saying. 'It was absolutely revolting.'

'Sorry to hear that,' Lily tucked her clipboard underneath her arm and leant up against the wall opposite Marlene. 'At least you have _Dorcas_ to look forward to when this is all over.'

'Oh, shut up!' Marlene leant forward and swatted at her, and Alice clicked her tongue.

'Oi! Sit still, I'm not finished!'

Lily shot Marlene a grin in the mirror and Marlene stuck her tongue out at her.

Alice and Lily were still teasing Marlene about the "new love of her life" when Liza and Summer walked in a few minutes later, closely followed by Kate and Cara who were clutching clipboards of their own and running through the schedule for the rest of the afternoon prep. One of the glories of having the proposal in the same building as the hotel was that it saved Lily and all the other producers a lot of time ensuring that the cast got from one spot to the other in one piece. Convenient or not, though, they still needed to be constantly on top of everyone to make sure that they kept to their shooting schedule. Especially today.

Though she was sure that she had the damn thing memorised by now, Lily pulled her clipboard back out from under her arm and flipped to James' schedule for the afternoon, ran her finger along the times and checked her watch. She hummed — they weren't late, but they _were_ cutting it a bit closer than she would have liked. Deciding that she was better spent waiting here for Marlene, especially now that Alice was nearly finished pinning Marlene's curls in place and she had a decent excuse, she pressed a button on her radio and called for Mary. Mary clicked into her ear a moment later, her voice as polite as ever. 'What do you need, Lils?'

'Where are you right now?'

'I was getting ready to check that James was getting ready.'

'Oh, excellent,' Lily said. 'Tell James he has twenty minutes.'

Lily heard Mary knock on James' door over her earpiece before she let go of the call button and the line fell silent again. Marlene raised her eyebrow at Lily, but Lily distinctly avoided her gaze, sifted through the papers on her clipboard instead, double checked the filming schedule for the day to make sure they didn't already miss some fucking call time that she'd forgotten about.

She knew they hadn't, but she'd do anything to avoid looking at Marlene right now.

'Ms Evans,' Lily's attention snapped back to Mary — she _never_ called her that unless there was really bad news. 'He says that he doesn't want to go through with this.'

Lily must have blanched, because Marlene was now looking at her with intense interest. Lily grabbed the end of her mouthpiece and pressed it closer to her mouth, lowered her voice as she walked swiftly out of the makeup room. 'Well he should have fucking thought about that before he decided to come here, there is nothing that I can do for him now! Tell him he _signed a contract_!'

She knew it was a low blow, having Mary remind him of the thing Lily had shouted at him most often during this whole fucking disaster, but she didn't know what else she could say, not while they weren't alone in a room together anyway.

Mary sighed and Lily heard her knock again before she cut the connection. Lily's anxiety peaked as she listened to the silence ringing in her ears, and she did her best to walk quickly through the corridors without breaking into a full run. Mary clicked back onto the radio.

'He said he doesn't care about the contract. He was packing his bags when he opened the door.'

A heavy weight dropped in her stomach. She should have known, she should have _fucking_ known. She felt the panic rising in her chest now, but she shifted towards safer (angrier) ground to try and get a handle on herself.

'I don't give a flying _fuck_ if he cares about the contract, and he better _not_ be packing his bags,' Lily hissed, and she doubled her pace through the hotel. 'Mary, keep him distracted, I'm going to be there in a minute.'

'Lily, I — '

'Mary, just fucking do it. I'm not losing this fucking finale episode because Potter's getting jitters. Talk to him, I'll be there in a minute.'

Mary was silent for a moment before she exhaled heavily, 'Yeah, alright. I'll do what I can.'

'That's all I ask.'

Lily was half-tempted to switch off her walkie, run into the nearest broom cupboard and scream out some of her stress, but she really, really didn't have time for that, especially if James was already packing his bags.

When she got to James' hotel room a moment later, she noticed that Mary had slid the catch so that she didn't have to wait to be let in (probably because if she knocked, there was no way that James was going to let her in). She rapped hard on the door as she pushed it open, and Mary and James, standing in the middle of the room, whipped around to look at her as she walked through the door. Mary's expression, stressed and apologetic, was the complete opposite of James' angry, defiant one.

'James, what's going on?' Lily did her best to slide into her "Nice Producer" voice even while she wanted to fucking throttle him, 'Liza and Summer are in hair and makeup already, I'm going to need you to — '

'No,' James said. He crossed his arms, shook his head, 'I told Mary I'm not doing it. I can't do that to them, they think — '

'James,' Lily said, gritting her teeth to keep it together, 'you signed a contract. The network will have you for everything you fucking have and then some if you back out now.'

'Surely you can make up some hyper dramatic ending that will make the network forget all about wanting to sue me,' James said, laughing derisively. 'That's your job, isn't it?'

That fucking stung and he knew it. Lily exhaled sharply.

'My _job,_ Mr. Potter, is to get you in a fucking tuxedo and up to that fucking observation deck so that you can propose to one of these fucking women. _That_ is my job and whether you like it or not, that's what you agreed to do, so you're going to stop whatever this,' she gestured vaguely in the air around him, 'is, and get it the fuck together. Mary — ' she turned quickly and caught Mary's eye, 'head to hair and makeup, make sure that Marlene is ready and then escort her up to the observation deck. Be back here to get James in fifteen to take him to set.'

It was a testament to Mary's faith in her that she didn't hesitate before she turned on her heel and walked out of the hotel room.

The moment Mary shut the door, Lily rounded on James, who was still standing there glaring at her. 'Glare at me all you like, but you're going to get into that tux _now.'_

'Lily, I fucking told you that I'm not doing this! I said it and I meant it!' He stepped closer to her, his voice rising, 'I'm not — _fuck,_ Lily, I'm not in love with them, I — '

'No,' Lily held up her hand, and James swore loudly. 'No, James,' her voice was shaking a bit, and so she gritted her teeth for a moment, steeling herself for the rest. 'I know that you have this delusion in your head that makes you think that you have feelings for me, but James you _don't._ And even if you did, it doesn't fucking matter!'

It was mean and wrong and low but she needed to get him out that door and whatever it fucking took — the last thing she wanted to do was watch him get fucking engaged to someone else, but —

'Of course it matters, Lily,' James said, stepping closer to her again. 'Of _course_ it fucking matters. And don't you _dare_ tell me that I don't have feelings for you. Lily, I —' He was standing closer than she realised, and when he reached out, rested his hand on her hip, she very nearly gave in.

As it was, his warm, honey eyes on hers, the pads of his fingers pressing into her hip, their bodies so close together that all it would take was a step forward and she could bury her fingers in his hair and bring his mouth to hers… it was all too much.

He licked his bottom lip, took a deep breath, and even though she knew what he was going to say, knew that she should stop him saying it, the incredibly selfish part of her couldn't bear to walk out of this room without hearing it. She knew that this was the absolute _worst_ moment, but she just —

'Lily,' he said, apparently emboldened by the fact that she hadn't shut him up and moved his hand from her hip or done any number of the other things that she should have done, 'I love you. I _love_ you, and I can't go out there and propose to somebody else when the only person that I've been thinking about for weeks has been you.'

She started shaking her head before he even finished his sentence. James' face fell, his fingers twitched on her waist.

'James,' she took a step back and his hand moved off her hip, dropped heavily between them, 'James, you can't do this now.' Her voice broke, and she sucked in a deep breath, desperate to regain her composure. 'Okay? You _can't_.'

James looked at her for a few long moments before his eyes dropped to the floor, his hand found its way into his hair. She couldn't believe that he wasn't saying anything, that James Potter, the man who _always_ fucking had something to say, was standing in front of her now in complete silence. She wanted to grab him by the elbows and shake him, explain that this wasn't how it was supposed to go, that she was pushing him away because she wanted him to fight for her. She wanted him to tell her that he was going to go out there and just _pick_ someone, that they were going to find a way to navigate this the moment they got off the show because now they were so close and surely, _surely_ there was a way.

She wanted it, but she knew that it was impossible.

And anyway, he'd been fighting for her for so long and she'd shut it down every time.

She shouldn't be surprised that he'd finally given up.

Lily pulled in one, long shaking breath, took another step back.

She switched on her radio, the feedback crackling through the air around them.

'Ten minutes,' she said, walking towards the door, 'Mary will be back to bring you to set.'

James nodded, but he didn't look up. Lily looked at him, for just a moment, before she turned on her heel and left the room, squaring her shoulders as she went.

* * *

Marlene was standing opposite James' door when Lily stepped out into the corridor. Lily, not expecting anyone to be there, nearly jumped out of her skin.

'Shit,' Lily said, clutching her chest, 'you scared me.'

Marlene didn't bother apologising. Instead she raised an eyebrow. 'What are you doing out here already?'

Lily's brow furrowed. 'What?'

Marlene shot her a look as they turned and started walking down the corridor. 'I thought you'd be in there longer,' she said, as smirk tugging at her lips. 'I thought I'd have to knock or something.'

'How did you even know I was still in there?!'

Marlene rolled her eyes. 'Mary told me she left you here when she came to pick me up.'

Lily cleared her throat, did her best to look casual. 'Oh, yeah. Sorry I couldn't take you up, James was getting jitters and — '

Marlene scoffed. 'Lily, it isn't just jitters, you know it isn't — '

Lily, already at her breaking point after her row with James, snapped. ' _Fuck_ , Marlene, save it, okay?!'

Marlene, never one to be intimidated by anyone's outbursts (least of all Lily's), grabbed her by the arm and pulled her through a door just to their left, into what turned out to be a guest-accessible laundry facility.

'No,' Marlene said, shutting the door behind them and rounding on Lily before she could ask what the _fuck_ they were doing in a laundry room when they had places to be. 'No, Lily, I won't "save it". What the _fuck_ are you doing?'

'What are you even talking about?' Marlene shot her a devastating glare, but Lily wasn't about to be shamed into submission. 'I don't know what you expected me to do in there.'

'Oh, I don't know, do what I've been telling you for weeks and figure out a way to avoid this whole mess?!'

Lily laughed derisively, but didn't bother denying it. 'How are we supposed to fix that? There's nothing I can do. Nothing either of us can do! Benjy said he should just propose to one of them and then break up with them after the show, but he just — he's refused and so I don't know what to do so we're just not doing anything.'

Marlene shook her head slowly. 'You are —' she pressed her fingers into her forehead before she looked back up at Lily. 'Lily, I love you,' Lily winced, her mind rocketing back to James, the look on his face the instant before she'd rejected him, 'but you're a complete fucking idiot. Just let him quit. Be done.'

Lily buried her hand in her hair and groaned, the sound almost loud enough to be a scream. 'He — He signed a fucking contract! We've shot this whole series, advertised the whole thing, the studio has spent all this money — it's too late now!'

'Since when have you started giving a fuck about this show?!'

'Since it's the only thing paying all my bills!'

'If you talked to James,' Marlene said, cutting across her, ' _really_ talked to him, I bet that you could figure something out.'

'But Peter — '

Marlene threw her hands up, 'Fuck Peter! You hate him _and_ this job anyway. Just go back and talk to James, I'll — I'll find Peter or whatever, distract him, I don't care. Whatever you two need, Lils, it's yours.'

'I — Mar, it's —' Lily sighed. 'It's just too late.'

She wanted to tell Marlene that she appreciated everything that she was promising her, that if this were any other situation, if she _really_ thought there was a way out, that she would take Marlene up on it in an instant and spend the rest of eternity singing Marlene's praises from the rooftops. But, as it was, she couldn't see how she and James could realistically get out of what he was contractually obligated to do.

He was going to propose to someone today.

And no matter how much she wanted to be able to intervene, no matter how convinced Marlene seemed to be that she could, Lily knew that there was absolutely no way around it. And with James' hesitance about breaking it off immediately afterward... she knew that he was going to take whatever relationship he threw himself into seriously. He was at least going to try.

Marlene stood there in silence for a moment watching her, waiting for Lily to change her mind. Eventually, when it became clear that Lily was absolutely determined to follow through regardless of the consequences, Marlene stepped forward and pulled Lily into a hug.

A few tears escaped as Marlene held her, and Lily wiped her eyes hastily when she pulled away. 'What was that for?'

Marlene squeezed Lily's arms before she dropped her hands and stepped back. 'You're going to need it.'

* * *

Marlene walked out of the laundry room a moment later, left Lily to her thoughts. Her radio was buzzing endlessly in her ear and Lily shut it off in frustration, desperate for some fucking quiet so that she could actually think through this, could actually remind herself why what she was doing was the right thing.

Though, "right," she supposed, was relative.

Everyone seemed to think that there was some easy way out of this, like Lily could just walk over to Peter and say, 'You know what, James and I have developed something of a relationship, and we'd actually like to pursue that, so the show's off, thanks.' No matter how much she thought about it, and despite what everyone seemed to think, Lily had spent weeks thinking about this and there was no reasonable way out. Benjy's idea was one she'd clung to because, though she'd have to watch him propose, she'd at least know that it wasn't real. She could tell herself that he was acting, it was pretend...

But James, already drowning in guilt from having carried on a relationship with Lily for most of the show, wasn't willing to propose to someone _knowing_ that he would immediately end things. And apparently his next tactic was to try and leave the moment that Lily left him alone, but now, having successfully averted _that_ nightmare, Lily wasn't sure what James was going to do out there.

She knew that he almost always went through with things once she got him onto set. No matter how cross or whatever he was at her, the moment he was in sight of those contestants, he usually just followed through.

She suspected that he might do the same thing today, but then... how long was he going to carry on for? How seriously was he going to take this proposal today?

Lily had no idea and the uncertainty of it all was seriously driving her anxiety through the roof.

After a few minutes, and a few more tears, Lily wiped her eyes, lifted her chin, and pulled her shoulders back. She took a deep breath and walked back out of the laundry room, pulling the door shut softly behind her.

She should have stopped in to check on Marlene, should have radioed Mary to make sure that James hadn't secretly packed his bags and left the moment he wasn't being observed, probably should have called Peter and let him know that James was getting immensely cold feet, but she didn't feel like doing any of those things at the moment. Instead, she walked down the corridor towards the lift and tried to convince herself that this was the right choice.

Normally, she would have gone to get James before they went to set and they would have made the trip together, would have chatted about something stupid, stood close and let their fingertips brush lightly against one another in a way that they could have said was innocent.

Now, she welcomed the alone time.

She couldn't have been in the lift with him anyway. Too close. Too isolated. Especially without Benjy.

She definitely would have said something to him (or held his hand or kissed him or pressed him up against the back wall and buried her hands in his hair or encouraged James' hands to make their way up her shirt) and she couldn't be put in a position where that was possible.

Not now.

When she got out of the lift on the 72nd floor, Lily made her way past the cameras set up around the perimeter towards the sleek pillar in the centre of the room. She hesitated, her eyes sweeping over the glass walls surrounding the set, the fairy lights lining the railings along one side of the deck, the basket of flower petals at the base of the pillar waiting to be scattered just before the cameras started rolling. It all made her feel a little sick to her stomach and not just because it was all too grossly romantic, too wildly impersonal to really mean anything.

She zipped her sweatshirt up just a bit higher, retreated to her usual spot behind the cameras, turned her radio back on.

People were immediately chattering away in her ear, and though she normally tried to at least half-listen so that she had a sense of what was going on across the set, today, she couldn't find it in herself to even pretend like she cared.

She tuned in just enough to listen for Mary's voice — everyone else could be safely ignored.

Marlene, standing in the corner getting mic'd up, noticed her walk in, and she raised an eyebrow in a way that almost made Lily crack a smile. Marlene crossed the room as soon as the sound guys had finished with her, careful to keep her voice low when she approached.

'You alright?'

Lily shrugged, and, remembering that Marlene was now being recorded, decided to make her verbal response as innocent as possible. 'Not feeling well,' she said, giving Marlene a significant look. 'It'll pass.'

Marlene looked like there were a dozen things on the tip of her tongue, but, thankfully, she said nothing. She reached out, took Lily's hand in her own for a moment and squeezed before she let Lily's hand fall back to her side.

'So, when're we going to start filming this first bit?' Marlene asked, her tone shifting into the swift, efficient tone Lily knew so well. Lily pulled her clipboard out from under her arm.

'They're filming the interview bits with Liza and Summer right now,' she said, skimming the list. 'Mary should be up here with James any moment, so we'll film your bit with him then. After that, uh — you know the drill.'

She tried to keep her voice even, but the idea of watching everything that was about to unfold was making her sick.

Marlene nodded. 'I do indeed.'

Normally they would have talked about who they thought he was going to keep, what they thought the rejected contestant was going to say when she found out that she was the one getting sent home, but today, none of that seemed like very entertaining conversation. Instead, they wandered over to the craft services table, shot each other swear filled glances about the truly depressing lack of carb-filled options, and ate all the fruit they could stomach so they had something to do with their hands.

She and Marlene were deep in a discussion about what food they were going to get the moment filming was over that night, when Lily saw James step off the lift over Marlene's shoulder. She froze, grape halfway to her lips, her eyes moving over him as he walked, eyes trained on the ground, through the set towards the windows.

Marlene snapped her fingers and Lily started, brought her eyes back to Marlene. 'Sorry,' she said, popping the grape in her mouth and trying her best to sound casual, 'what were you saying?'

Marlene shook her head. 'Nevermind, I've got to go get my shots in now. We'll talk later, yeah? Find us a pub to go to tonight — I have a feeling I'm going to need a drink later.'

She shot Lily a significant look before she stalked off towards where James was standing at the opposite end of the set.

* * *

 **See you next week xx**


	37. Chapter 36

**Happy Sunday! Xx**

 **OH HEY ALSO - Eligible was nominated for the Drama and the WIP award from beyondthebookfanfictionnook! THANK YOU A MILLION TO WHOEVER NOMINATED ME and, if you'd like to vote, you can find the voting here (sorry, the link is going to look crazy because FFN is the worst site in the world): goo . gl** **/ forms / rmftYXRG9V5yuIff2**

* * *

It was about as terrible as Lily expected that it would be, listening to James talk to Marlene about Liza and Summer.

She shouldn't have felt as awful as she did, especially when she thought about the things he'd said on the bridge the day before, the things he'd meant for her, but somehow, it really just made it all that much worse.

There is no way that he meant any of those things for her now. Not after what she'd said to him in his room.

He talked about the way Summer smiled, how brightly she laughed, how hilariously adorable her American accent was. He talked about Liza and that day back in Leeds when they'd played football at her school. He felt like he'd fit there, he said, like everything was easy. It was fun, maybe the most fun he'd had the whole time he'd been on the show, but then he remembered the dolphins at Summer's home in Florida and dinner in the dark in Paris and then he talked himself into a circle again.

It was masterful, how he did it. There was no way the viewers would be able to guess who he was going to choose. Even Lily, having seen them behind the scenes as she had over the last few weeks, couldn't decide who she thought he was going to select that evening.

Marlene asked him, more for herself than for the show because it was certainly going to get edited out, which woman he was planning on choosing. James' expression, usually so fluid and easy to read, didn't give a single thing away. He just shrugged. 'You'll have to wait and see.'

He moved, then, like he was going to look over at where Lily was standing in the corner. It was an involuntary movement, but he mastered it before he'd actually made eye contact with her.

An hour later, the stage was set.

James was standing at the end of a long, petal-strewn aisle, the whole of the London skyline behind him. He kept nervously shifting his weight, adjusting his glasses, fiddling with his cufflinks, and while she normally would have chastised him for wiggling around so much, she didn't mind if the camera got a few shots of him looking nervous.

It would make for good filler if they needed it.

Summer was scheduled to come through first, and she was positively beaming when she floated into the room — she was wearing a long, turquoise dress that flowed like water as she moved and it looked beautiful with her soft golden hair. She reached out and took James' hands when she reached him at the pedestal, her smile somehow widening as she looked at him.

'Hi.'

James smiled back, but it was small, reserved.

And in that moment, Lily knew what was going to happen.

'Hi,' he said. His voice was quieter than it normally would have been, and Lily did her best to control her facial expressions in case Summer happened to look over and catch her grimacing.

But Summer's eyes were trained on James, the smile on her face bright and warm and hopeful. And Lily couldn't believe, she couldn't _believe_ that she'd done what she had to this woman. Summer was _happy,_ to her core, she was happy, and she was kind and funny and dazzling, and maybe it didn't matter, now, but —

She'd deserved to have a chance with James because he made her happy and she could have made him happy. She could have made him so, so happy. And maybe James would have eliminated her anyway, maybe he would have gone with Liza anyway, but Summer hadn't even gotten her chance.

Liza hadn't really either, but Summer...

Just seeing the look on her face, her smile... it really hit Lily just how unfair it had all been.

'I thought a lot,' James paused and took a breath because his voice was shaking so hard that he was difficult to understand.

'I thought a lot,' his voice was stronger this time, clearer, 'over these past few days about our time together — I'd never met a dolphin trainer before, and now I've met you _and_ kissed a dolphin, so...' James laughed quietly and Summer grinned at him.

'If you say that that dolphin is a better kisser than me….'

James laughed, his face temporarily lighting up, and shook his head. 'No, never.'

He shifted his grip on her hands and his expression settled. He paused for a moment, took another breath.

'Summer, you are the kind of person that brings light into every room you enter. You make everyone happier and you bring so much joy to the people that are lucky enough to know you. I am so unbelievably lucky to have gotten to know you.

'But,' he squeezed Summer's hands lightly before he dropped them. They fell heavily between them and Summer pulled in a sharp breath as the reality of what was happening washed over her.

'I can't stand in front of you now and tell you that I think we can carry this forward, not when I have such strong feelings for someone else.'

Summer pulled in another breath and she looked away from James for a moment to brush the tears off her cheeks. As she turned, Lily caught a better look at her face and she immediately wished she hadn't. She looked so heartbroken, shocked and hurt and fucking heartbroken, and Lily knew that it was going to be like this for one of them and it wasn't like she hadn't gone through this last year. She'd known that this was going to happen, but watching Summer...

If Lily was honest, this was affecting her as strongly as it was because Summer was externalising everything that Lily was holding in her own chest.

James cleared his throat and, when she looked, Lily noticed that his hands were shaking a bit. Summer took one more moment, one more breath, before she looked back up at him.

'Summer, I wish you all the happiness in the world,' he said. 'Truly. You are such an astounding person and I am better for having known you. I know that you're going to make someone so unbelievably happy — he'll be the luckiest bastard on earth.'

Summer breathed a laugh then and nodded jerkily. 'Yeah, he will be.'

James lifted his arms a bit. 'Can I — can I hug you? Is that alright?'

Summer was nodding as she stepped into him and Lily watched as she buried her face into his suit jacket, her fingers clenching hard into the fabric at his back. She stood there for a moment before she pulled away. She flicked the last of the tears off her cheeks, took a deep breath, and gave him her best smile.

'It was lovely getting to know you, James. I'm sorry it wasn't me, but do I wish you and Liza the best.'

She hugged James one more time before she turned and started back down the aisle.

A few of the cameras followed her out, and Lily thought she heard Summer burst into tears again once she was out in the corridor, but she couldn't be sure. Lily walked swiftly across the room towards James, the sick, swirling feeling in her stomach getting harder and harder to ignore.

'You alright?'

James didn't look at her, just nodded curtly before he reached up and brushed a tear from the corner of his eye. 'I'll be fine. I just need a minute.'

'Yeah, sure, of course — whatever you need.'

James exhaled hard, crossed the room, and practically threw himself into a chair along the far wall. He dropped his head into his hands and Lily watched the slow rise and fall of his back as he tried to steady himself.

He sat there the entire time the cameras reset, didn't move a single inch until Jax called him back to his mark.

He still looked shaken, a bit removed, and Lily had half a mind to cross into the shot and encourage him to smile, but then she saw Liza start into the room from the corner of her eye and James visibly relaxed.

She tried not to commit that to memory.

Where Summer had been bright and colorful, Liza had gone more reserved in her finale outfit. Her floor length dress was a pale gold that shimmered in the light as she walked, her red hair hung round her shoulders in loose waves, and the smile she wore was soft, tentative, but hinted at the depth of emotion she was concealing.

She was beautiful. Unbelievably so.

Liza reached for James' hands the minute she stopped beside him at the pedestal.

'Hello.' She sounded unbearably nervous, and James squeezed her hands, smiled reassuringly before Liza slid her hands from his and dropped them back by her sides.

'Hi. You alright?'

Liza half shrugged, breathed a laugh. 'No. I'm so nervous.'

James grinned. 'You need to take another breath?'

She laughed and nodded before she pulled in a slow, deep breath. Her eyes fell closed for a moment and, when she opened them again, her expression had cleared.

'Feeling better?'

She smiled, _beamed_. 'Yes.'

James returned her smile before he cleared his throat and his expression evened out. 'Liza you were one of the first people on this show that I really liked. You're kind, unbelievably so, and you always think the best of everyone, even when they really, _really_ don't deserve it.'

They both knew exactly who he was talking about and they shared a quiet laugh.

'Getting to know you over the course of our time together has been… amazing. I've gotten to see what a warm, thoughtful person you are and I've realised how lucky I am to be able to know someone like you.

'I just said goodbye to Summer,' James said, and Lily saw Liza's face light up from across the room, her face shining with the beginnings of happiness as James reached over and took her hands loosely in his.

Lily felt her heart falter in her chest, felt her own hands twitch by her sides as she remembered what it was like when James' hands were in hers, when James' hands were on her arms, her waist, her back…

She knew, logically, that it probably wasn't going to last between them, James and Liza — that having to practically drag James out of his room wasn't a promising start to an engagement, but it didn't make watching this any easier, didn't make the proposal any less real. She was going to have to stand there and listen to him tell Liza that he loved her, that it was her, had been her and no one else. He'd said things throughout the series, about how he was feeling connections with certain women, about how they made him feel, but this… this was different altogether.

Before she could just lie to herself, pass it off as talk, acting for the cameras. It hadn't made it easier, but it had made it bearable. This, though. This was a fucking proposal.

He was going to talk to her about building a life. Sunday mornings.

She pulled in a deep breath. Exhaled.

'But Liza,' James said, and Lily saw him squeeze Liza's hands before he dropped them and Liza let them fall back to her sides, a bewildered look on her face. 'I just,' James ran a hand through his hair, tried to maintain eye contact with Liza despite the fact that Lily could tell that he wanted to be looking anywhere else. 'We said that we would always be honest with one another, and — I can't stand here and ask you to marry me when I know that I'm not in love with you.'

Lily's heart stopped.

James…. He... Oh my god.

Oh my fucking god.

The other producers started going mad in her ear, all screaming at once, begging her to do something as soon as she possibly could, to _fix this before we all lose our jobs_.

'Lily, he can't —

'I thought you had — '

'What the _fuck_?!'

She couldn't do anything while they were filming, though, and Peter had already shouted into their ears that 'No one, _no one_ is to move into the shot, let it play out,' and so she stood just out of frame, bouncing on the balls of her feet, gripping her clipboard so tightly it was cutting into her palm.

Liza was crying in earnest now, and James looked like he was dying inside.

'Why — I don't understand,' Liza reached up and wiped away the tears on her cheeks, took a shaky breath.

James brushed a tear quickly off his cheek and cleared his throat. It didn't make a difference, though, because his voice was still shaking hard when he spoke. 'I didn't want to hurt you —'

'You're hurting me right now.'

'Liza, I'm so, so sorry,' but Liza just held up her hand, shook her head, sucked in another sharp breath, and turned to walk off down the aisle without saying another word, squaring her shoulders and holding her head high as she went.

One of the cameramen took off down the aisle after her, and Lily waited a moment before she rushed over from her spot along the wall.

'James, what the _fuck_ — '

James held up his hand, 'Save it, Lily. I came up here, I did what you wanted, I'm _done.'_

'James — '

'I _told_ you that I couldn't do this, and I meant it. Lily, I — '

She held up her hand, shot him a stern look, hissed through her teeth, 'You're mic'd up and there are cameras everywhere — '

James ran a frustrated hand through his hair, 'I don't care, I — '

'Evans,' her head snapped up at Peter's voice in her ear, like she half expected to turn around and find him standing there, 'get the fuck out of the shot!'

Lily turned back to James, 'I —'

James waved her off, leaned back against one of the railings at the edge, let his head fall into his hands. 'Just go.'

She took one more deep breath before she turned on her heel and walked out of the shot.

* * *

 **I was going to just leave it here, but I started editing the next chapter before I could help myself, so... see you v soon!**


	38. Chapter 37

**Welcome back! I just couldn't resist giving you another chapter today. Xx**

* * *

It was the most popular episode of a reality programme in uTV history.

Peter had sent her a basket of fruit and champagne and some other shit she hadn't really looked at with a giant singing card after the live finale months later, thanking her for making the series such a success. At the time, Lily had expected Peter to be upset with her, to shout at her about not getting James to just fucking propose to someone for the cameras _at least,_ but Peter made sure to get lots and _lots_ of shots of James looking sad and dejected, had practically skipped out to James after they'd cut the cameras for the night to thank him for the unexpected twist.

He'd turned to her after James had stalked off back to his room.

 _If you hadn't convinced him to come down —_

After the live finale...

She didn't even look at the card before she threw it into the bin in a rage.

She was half tempted to pitch the champagne and fruit and all the rest of it right in there, too, but she just couldn't bring herself to waste food like that.

She'd told Peter as soon as filming ended that she wasn't going to come back to produce the third series, that she just couldn't justify the ethics of it to herself anymore. She was a little bit terrified, thinking about the bills that were going to start stacking up if she didn't find a replacement gig soon, but after this series, there was just no way that she could bring herself to take on a third year.

Everything would be haunted by this series. Absolutely everything. And so even though she was terrified, now having said the words she been turning over in her head since the first damn series, she couldn't help the anxiety that was already starting to twist in her gut when she thought about it all.

Still, she reminded herself over and over, she wouldn't have had work right now anyway, even if she _had_ agreed to stay on with the show until next year because of the break in between series. As long as she found a gig before production was due to start back up again, she'd be alright.

Despite her resignation, Peter'd insisted that she stay on through the end of the series, that she continue to work with James for the live finale because they'd had such a productive working relationship through the series and he didn't want to jeopardise that, especially now that he was likely going to have the whole country against him once they realised what happened with the selection.

She didn't know how she was supposed to disagree when Peter was so obviously right.

She hadn't seen James since that last night on set — he'd gotten into his car the next morning without saying goodbye, hadn't texted or called since they'd wrapped. She'd half expected that he would reach out once the show started airing about a month after filming ended, but James never reached out. Never said a word.

She'd texted him a few times, but she never got a response. He hadn't even read them.

It was painful, watching the show back, knowing what she knew about the ending. She was sure that it felt that way for Liza, and probably Summer, too, who had to know how the show ended by now. She tried to avoid getting on the internet on Monday nights, wanted to avoid seeing all the #Eligible nonsense that flooded Twitter every week. It got even worse when she realised that Liza, poor Liza, was something of a fan favourite, a happy little accident that ensured that the final episode was going to be the absolute shit show that Peter had hoped it would be from the moment they'd cut back in July.

When #TeamLiza saw the finale, the uproar was immediate.

Every entertainment magazine in the country dragged James through the mud, said that he hadn't chosen anyone because he was an arsehole, that he'd only been on the show in the first place because he wanted to keep getting media attention after his career ending injury. Gossip programmes on TV and radio talked about him endlessly, said they had quotes from "an inside source on the show" that claimed that James only ever cared about being on telly, that he was never there for love in the first place. James caught so much Twitter abuse that he stopped using his account altogether (at least, he'd stopped tweeting from it and, these days, that was all Lily really had to go on).

It was frustrating because there was very little that anyone on the show could say to prove that James had been invested in finding a relationship when the show ended the way it did. Sure, part of his motivation for the show had been to get out of the house, to have something to do just as football training was starting up and he was going to be sitting at home for the first time in his career, but it wasn't like he'd sought them out and demanded he be on the show — he'd been recruited, and sure, he'd accepted, but it felt unfair to paint him as some media hungry wanker. And anyone that had watched James throughout the series, anyone that had paid even a speck of attention, had to have realised how important love actually was to him. It had taken them all by surprise the first few weeks, that the pretty boy footballer was actually very, very serious when it came to his romantic entanglements, but it had been true nonetheless. There was no way that you could miss that if you were watching — it was on his face in every fucking shot, every diary interview he did.

Though maybe Lily only noticed it because she was the one it was all for.

On finale night, though, none of this had happened yet. James hadn't become a national enemy in the matter of a few sentences, hadn't spent weeks getting dragged by the media. On finale night, all of this was still on the horizon, the storm waiting just off the coast, temporarily overshadowed by the fact that she and James were, once again, going to have to be in the same room.

She'd sent him another message in the week leading up, an easy _hope you're well let me know if you need me to have anything in the dressing room for you on Monday,_ but, as she'd expected at that point, she hadn't heard anything back.

She managed to forget about it for most of the week, to brush off his avoidance, but then it was Sunday night, the eve of the finale, and she was going to be seeing him for the first time in months — it was unnerving and she was having an increasingly difficult time ignoring the panic in her stomach.

She fought the urge to reach out to him again, to text him until she got a reply, to call him until he picked up. She needed to know that he was okay with everything that was going to have to happen tomorrow, that he understood that they were going to be alone together again, that they were going to have to talk.

It's almost over, she would say. You never have to see me again once we get through this night.

She'd been pacing back and forth in her flat for the better part of an hour, losing an increasingly intense battle with herself about whether she should call him, when there was a knock on the door.

Her heart stuttered to a halt in her chest.

She was across the flat in doubletime and only gave herself a moment to get her bearings before she opened the door.

She tried not to feel deflated when she saw that it was Remus standing there.

'Try not to look so disappointed,' Remus said, smiling at her. It was a bit stiff, but she appreciated that he was making the effort. 'Can I come in?'

'Yeah,' she said, stepping back to give Remus room to walk past her into the flat. 'Of course.'

Remus followed her down into the sitting room, happily accepted Lily's offer to put the kettle on, and settled himself onto Lily's sofa while she walked off into the kitchen to prepare their tea. When she returned a few minutes later, he was looking around her lounge, taking in all the details, before he turned and smiled at her.

'Thanks,' he said, accepting his cup from her outstretched hand.

Lily sat down onto the sofa beside him. 'Brew alright?'

He nodded and took a sip as though to prove the point. 'It's great.'

They drank quietly for a moment, Remus having gone back to looking around Lily's lounge, before Lily finally worked up the courage to say what she said next.

'So, what exactly are you doing here? Not that it isn't lovely to see you,' she added when Remus turned and gave her a look she couldn't quite read. 'I just wasn't expecting to see you, or anyone tonight. Or, you know, ever.'

'That's what I'm here about, funny enough,' Remus said. He sat up a bit straighter on the couch, crossed his legs and rested his mug on his knee.

'James, at Sirius' encouragement, seems to be taking an "ignore the problem until it goes away" kind of stance and they won't listen to a damn word I say to the contrary.'

'And —'

'You're the problem, yes.'

Lily had no idea how he knew what she was going to ask, but Remus didn't give her much time to think on it.

'Not that you aren't lovely, of course, because really, you are.' Remus took another sip of his tea. 'I wouldn't be here right now if I didn't like you. But honestly, I'm getting a little tired of this shit from you and James.'

'I — Remus, this isn't just "shit". This is complicated.'

'It's always complicated, Lily, but ignoring it isn't going to make it go away.'

'I'm not ignoring anything, I'm just trying to give him space —'

'You really think this is a good idea?' Remus asked, his tone thick with disbelief. 'Just sitting around and ignoring one another until you're both forced into the same room? When has that ever worked well for anyone?'

Lily shrugged. 'Well, I don't know, but — '

'No,' Remus shook his head, 'no "but" — you know you're being an idiot, he knows he's being an idiot, but you're both so damn stubborn and so you're both just going to let this spiral out of control because you both just want to be right.'

Lily knew that he wasn't entirely off the mark, but still, she wasn't ready to admit it. 'Why do I have to be the one to apologise? It's not like I was the only one in this relationship.'

Remus shook his head, successfully heading off the angry outburst Lily was preparing. 'No, I know. And don't think I haven't been saying to him everything that I'm saying to you now. I'm here because one of you is eventually going to have to be the bigger person and — '

'Well, why does that have to be me?'

Remus dipped his head for a moment and sighed heavily. 'I know that you're still pissed off with him for blindsiding you, but honestly, he felt trapped. He didn't love either of those women, Lily, you can't honestly have expected him to get engaged.'

'But he — '

'Signed a contract,' Remus sighed. 'I'm aware. I"ve heard about this damn contract nonstop for the past few months, and, frankly, I'm fucking sick of hearing about it.'

Lily looked down at her knees.

'Look.' Remus was brushing a piece of hair out of his eyes when Lily looked back up at him. 'I know that this is awkward and I'm not stupid enough to think that this conversation is going to be an easy one. But Lily…. I saw you two when you were doing James' hometown. I saw how you looked at each other. And even now… I know you aren't talking to one another, but James…'

Remus looked at her so seriously, then, and Lily felt her heart climb into her throat.

'Lily, James hasn't stopped talking about you since he got home. He's angry and hurt, but it's nothing you can't have a conversation about. There's nothing here that can't be fixed.'

The faintest bit of hope started unfurling in her stomach, and it took everything she had to keep from leaning into it.

'I don't know how we're supposed to fix it, Remus. I think we cocked it up pretty bad.'

Remus sighed. 'Yeah, you did. But that doesn't mean it's beyond repair. Lily, this — this is so stupid. I know that it'll be logistically difficult for a while, but so you talk when he gets to the studio tomorrow and you date. Normally. Quietly. And then after a while, maybe you come out in public a bit. People'll have forgotten by then.'

'The finale — Remus, it's going to huge.'

'So maybe you wait a bit longer,' Remus said and Lily breathed a laugh. He smiled at her, softly, bracingly. 'Either way, it's nothing you can't work through.'

Lily looked down at her feet, bit the inside of her lip as she drew in a deep, slow breath. When she looked back up at Remus again, he was smiling at her like he already knew what she'd decided.

'Lovely,' he reached out and rested his hand on her elbow for a moment before he leant over and pulled her into a one-armed hug. She hadn't expected it, not from Remus who was a bit more physically distant than either Sirius or James, and the surprise of it, the suddenness of it, went through her like a shock.

And then she was pressing her face into Remus' shirt and sucking in embarrassingly sharp gasps of breath, trying her best not to cry all over his fucking t shirt, and Remus didn't seem surprised at all.

He leant over, taking her with him, and set his mug on the table before he wrapped both his arms around her. He squeezed her shoulders a bit tighter, told her that it was alright, and she knew that he meant it as a comfort, but all she could think about was James and his room and _it's going to be alright, Evans_ and she burst into tears before she could stop herself.

It wasn't alright. It wasn't fucking alright at all.

Still, she wasn't going to _completely_ lose herself in Remus' arms — he wasn't exactly a stranger, but they certainly didn't know one another well enough for this and she was beyond embarrassed at her behaviour. It took her a minute to get herself sorted, for her to steady her breathing enough that she felt like she could step back and wipe her eyes on her sleeve.

She noted, with a flush, that she'd cried a fair bit into his t shirt, but Remus didn't seem to mind.

He smiled down at her, and the look on his face — it was so sad, so understanding, and Lily wanted to fall back into him and start fucking crying again.

She squared her shoulders. 'I'm sorry I cried onto your t shirt.'

Remus shook his head. 'Nothing to be sorry about. You needed to get it out and we both know that you weren't going to do that alone.'

She breathed a laugh, reached up and wiped a few more tears from her cheeks. 'Yeah.'

Remus smiled at her again before his expression evened out, became just a touch more serious.

'You're going to reach out to him? Call or text or something?'

Lily took a deep breath, fought the immediate urge to tell Remus that she was going to do no such thing because there was absolutely no point in talking to someone that clearly didn't want to talk to you.

'Yeah,' she nodded, and the action seemed to solidify her reserve to follow through. 'Yeah, I'll reach out.'

* * *

It took her a minute (and a bottle of cabernet) after Remus walked out the door to really get a handle on herself again.

She walked around her flat for a while, one hand tugging at her hair as she chugged wine straight from the bottle and mumbled to herself about why she couldn't do the things that Remus had told her to do. She tried to remind herself that this was, really, a horrible idea, and that there was no way that James would forgive her.

But the longer she thought about it, and the drunker she got, the more that she realised Remus was right. She couldn't sit here and not reach out to him and then expect to roll up to the studio on Friday and have everything be alright. She couldn't expect him to know what she was thinking, couldn't expect him to come around, couldn't expect him to apologise to her, not when she had so much to apologise for.

She couldn't expect anything to change if they weren't going to do anything differently.

They were both so bloody stubborn, they were, and as much as she hated it, as annoyed as she was that Remus had managed to completely understand her and her actions and all her fucking bullshit, she couldn't deny that he was right. She had to, if she wanted this to change, she had to do something.

And anyway, she'd promised Remus that she would and what kind of woman was she if she started breaking her promises on top of everything else?

And so before she let herself think too much about it, before she could talk herself out of it again (or the wine wore off and she lost what little nerve she had), she walked into her bedroom, grabbed her laptop off her chest of drawers, and plopped down on the edge of her bed. It took her a moment to get started, but once she'd started writing, it was damn near impossible to stop.

 _To: jamesfpotter_

 _From: ljevans_

 _Date: 8 November 2017 23:04_

 _Subject: I'm Sorry_

 _Hi James,_

 _I know its weird for me to be emailing you espiecually since we aren't exaclt y talking right now, but also because I'm pretty sure I never emailed yu once in our time working together. Unless I was forwarding you something fucking peter sent me (though you didn't eeed those anyway so i don't know if those even count). But i mean okay I know that we aren't in a fucking romcom and that me sitting down at my computer and writing you an email like I'm fucking Meg Ryan isn't goign to do shit — it's not goijgn to fix anything, it's not going to change the way I treated you, the way things turned out. It's not going to magically fix anything but you aren't answering my phone calls or my texts and I can't have the next time I see you, the next time that I toalk to you be when I have to fucking work with you again st the finale. So even though I'm not talking to you, not live at least, I hope you'll read this. I'm sure you won't — I'm sure youi're not even reading this right now. I'm sure you saw that it was from me and you just deleted it and so I'm essentially just sitting here talking to myself about things I need you to know._

 _So, hi, me. How are you doing?_

 _Fucking miserable._

 _Anyway James — my impulse is to either just delete this email and not send it to you al all — which might still happen, who the fuck knows — or just jump right into 'business as usual' Lily, producer Lily, and pretendt aht the isseus that exist don't exist, to just get down to business, defeat the Huns, etc etc. I, fuck, I mean, I'm really trying to be serious here (ha) but I can't — sorry — defence mechanisms die hard and I've had a bit pissed and I know that this is an email and tha tI could just delete out all this fucking rambling that doesn't make any sense or that shows you just how, I do'tknow, fucked up I am right now, but it feels wrong to edit myself when I'm talking to you. I don't know, James. I don't. know._

 _Anyway._

 _I'm sorry — I know that it took me way too many paragraphs of rambling to get here, but I'm sorry. I'm sorry for being an arsehole, I'm sorry for letting things go the way that they went. I'm not sorry that we did what we did. Not anymore. I used to be but then I thought about it (a lot) and I'm not sprry that we had the relationship that we had. I'm not sorry about any of that. I'm only sorry because it hurt people. That's it. Separating that in my head took a lot of time and its still a little confusing, finding the line sometimes, but James, you…. You are one of the best things that has ever happened to me. You're amazing, fucking amazing,a nd Neeed you to know that. I need you to know that wehn I was with you, i was fantastincally happy even though I was working on this shit show that I hate and I knew that things weren't going to end well and I spent 99pc of my time telling you that were weren't going to go anywher.e_

 _I think about the day near Tower Bridgea ll the damn time. I have made so many Sunday mornings for us in my head and — James, even when I was tellin gyou we couldn't go anywhere, you made me so unbelieveably happy._

 _I know that that's prbably not fair and I'm sure that that means nothing to you now, but it's true._

 _You mean so much to me — there are a lot of ways that I could put that, btu I don't want to put that in writing. Not yet. I want you to hear it with, you know, your fucking ears the first time that I say it to you. YOu know what I'm talking about, you know that it's true, you've known it for months, and I think, in part, that that's why what happened was so frustrating for you. Because you knew, you knew it was true and I kept lying to you and saying that it wasn't. Because it shouldn't have been trye, we shouldn't have had the relationship that we had, we shouldn't have done the things that we ddi — whether or not I regret them now, we shouldnt have done them adn It hink we both know that. It wasn't fair to Liza or Summer or anyone else on the show. It wasn't fair to them._

 _And I know that you're probably sitting here reading this, assuming you're reading this, just running your hands through your hair like 'fucking hell Evans if yo'd just let me break up with them months go or stop filming or let me do any of the things that I was asking you to do we couldn've gotten out of this messa nd dated and been fine' and maybe you're right. Maybe. And you know tha tkills me to say because I hate being wrong, but I still don't feel like I know. Everyone would have lost their jobs, James. You would've been sued and I never would've worked again and everyone would have lsot their jobs._

 _I don't know what I'm supposed to say other thant he fact that I'm sorry and I miss you. I miss you so much. And I don't expect you to forgive me — it was a lot — and I know that we both made shit decisions and we both were dumb adn got ourselves into this situation that could maybe have been avoided._

 _That first fucking lunch…. I don't know_

 _I look back on it all and I think, how would you have known that first lunch that anythign was supposed to happen with us, that hwat happened whas going to happen? How were we supposed to do somethign differently? I look back and I see a trail of mistakes but I can't see where we were supposed to make a different decision. I can't see what we could have done in the moment that would have been different._

 _Maybe Barcelona. Maybe then. That's the only time tht I can think of. I don't know._

 _I probably shouldn't have kissed you that day. But looking back on it, even knowing everything that came afterwards, I can't bring myself to regret that._

 _Or maybe if I'd just kissed you the first time I ever thought about it. Everything would have been different if I'd done that. Or maybe it would still have been all twisted up but at least it would have been twisted up earlier and maybe we would have been able to do something about it._

 _Anyway — I miss you. Every time something happens, you're the first person that I think to call and you're not there. Every time I want to talk, I want to talk to you. I want to hear your voice, your laugh, hear that tone you get when you're trying so hard not to be obnoxious about something adn just failing misterably. I want to hug you… I want to you, you know, other things, too, obviously, but… I just want you to be there. I want to be ther.e I want to sit on teh couch in dead silence and watch telly and I want to laugh abotu the fucking news and I want to take hte piss out of Sirius and I want all the things that we didn't get to have. I want to do it right._

 _I know that it's too late for any of that. I know that we can't go back and start over and honestly, I don't think that I'd want that anyway. We fucked up , like really fucked u, but I'd be lying through my goddamn teeth if I said that I regretted any of this._

 _I just want you in my life. Even if we can't bea nything more than friends, I don't care. I just want you in my life, however you're willing to have me in it. You're everything, James._

 _You're everything._

 _That seems really dramatic, especially for someone who isn't in a romcom. But anyway. I highly doubt you've read this far. But maybe, if you've skimmed down to the bottom of this email —_

 _Tl;dr — I miss you. I'm sorry. I'll see you tomorrow._

 _Xxx Lily_

* * *

 **See you next Sunday!**


	39. Chapter 38

**Happy Sunday! Enjoy xx**

* * *

On finale day, Lily arrived at the studio hours before she needed to and hid in her office (well, what _used_ to be her office) to get herself together. She'd practically sprinted through the halls, paranoid that she was going to end up seeing James in the corridor and having to talk to him before she was ready, but early as she was, she didn't see anyone.

She'd felt more pathetic that she was willing to admit, running through the damn halls like a petrified child, but there she was.

She'd forgotten, in the post-wine haze that she'd woken up in that morning, that she'd sent what, she realised upon re-reading, was easily one the most pathetic emails she'd ever written in her life. James hadn't replied — she hadn't expected him too — but now that the wine had worn off and she was going to be seeing him in just a few short hours, she couldn't remember why she ever thought that that fucking email would be a good idea.

Or why the _fuck_ she'd rambled on about being Meg bloody Ryan.

She had half a mind to pop down to the shop, grab another bottle of wine, and chug it so that she could get through the rest of the day despite the fact that her nerves were already completely fried, but she was also pretty sure that that would be the worst possible thing that she could do given the circumstances. So she just sucked it up and made due.

She was able to wile away most of the morning in minute tasks — conferring with Mary about some information they needed to get Marlene for the live interviews, talking to journalists that were covering the show, confirming the contestant appearances with the other production staff — but James was always there in the back of her mind, constantly tugging at her thoughts and taking over when she had more than a moment to herself. He was there when she caught herself running her hand through her hair in frustration because a journalist from the fucking _Sun_ was being an arsehole, he was there when she ordered a kebab for lunch from that place he'd taken them to back in May — he was always there, him and all his reminders.

He'd written himself all over her, he had. The realisation of it, of each individual thing that had been his and was now hers, settled heavily in her stomach, but not in an unpleasant way, in a yearning sort of way.

Well, it was a bit unpleasant, but only because she wanted something — a connection, a friendship, a relationship — that was no longer there.

James was due to arrive at the studio around four — he'd have enough time to get dressed, visit hair and makeup, run through questions with Marlene, and, hopefully, come to terms with the fact that he'd be seeing Liza and Summer for the first time in a few months — and though, at the start of the day, four o'clock had seemed ages away, it wasn't long before Stan was ringing her and telling her that James had just walked past him and was heading towards the lifts.

'Looks mighty sad today, he does,' Stan said. 'Anything I can do to help?'

'No, that's alright, Stan.' Lily tried her best to put on her falsely happy voice, her "I don't know what you're talking about" voice. 'I reckon he's just tired.'

'Ah, that'll be it,' Stan said.

She let herself sit and stare at her computer screen for a few more minutes, let the dread wash over her completely so that when she eventually pushed herself up from her chair and walked into James' dressing room, there wouldn't be anything left to mull over. Everything was going to roll off her back when she straightened her spine. She was a professional.

It mostly worked.

No matter how much control she might have been able to exert over her mind, though, she wasn't able to control the way that her body responded as she stood, crossed her office, and began walking down the corridor. Couldn't control the way that her hands shook even when she curled her fingers and pressed her nails into her palm, couldn't control the way that her breath was coming in shorter, sharper points as she imagined what he was going to look like when she walked in there. She could almost see him, his hair standing on end, his glasses crooked and halfway down the bridge of his nose, the dark shadows under his warm hazel eyes, the broad lines of his shoulders that would surely be a bit slumped with exhaustion. She had such a clear picture of him in her mind that she should have been prepared when she knocked once, twice on the door of his dressing room and walked in.

She should have been prepared, but she absolutely fucking wasn't.

He was standing in the middle of the room when she entered, having clearly just walked in a moment before. He was in the process of pulling off his jacket, and Lily couldn't help but run her eyes over the long lines of his biceps as the jacket slid off his arms and he tossed it onto the sofa between them.

He was everything that she'd imagined he would be, right down to the dark bags under his eyes and the crooked glasses, but she'd forgotten just how staggering he was, how her heart jumped in her chest at the sight of him, how her fingers itched to touch him the moment they were within any kind of proximity to one another. She forgot the weight of him, how he filled the air around her, and as the door fell shut behind her with a resounding click and the tension thickened, she was reminded of how it felt when she was alone with him. Like the air got denser and stuck to her skin, like she was surfacing after a deep dive and taking that first, sharp gulp of air — she noticed everything, felt everything. Every nerve she had stood on end when he was around and she felt electrified.

She'd forgotten that it was like this and now she could barely breathe with remembering.

She cleared her throat. 'Hey.'

She hadn't wanted to be the first one to speak, but she wasn't sure that he was going to, not when he was looking at her like he was. His face was, as it had been the last time she'd seen him, completely inscrutable. Too even.

'Hey.'

'How was your trip in?'

'Alright.'

'Cold out there?'

He half shrugged, looked down and watched as he scuffed the toe of his shoe on the worn carpet. 'A bit.'

So this is what they were reduced to.

And fine, _fine,_ it wasn't like she expected him to come in here and want to talk about everything. She'd been preparing herself for this eventuality, so she wasn't sure why her stomach felt like it was fucking bottoming out. She knew, she'd known going into this, that they were probably just going to have the kind of cold, professional day they'd had so many times over the course of filming. The days where they both just put their heads down, the days where they did just enough, said just enough, to get through what they had to get through.

She'd been expecting it, she'd been planning for it, but she still couldn't help the slight prickling in the corners of her eyes as she realised that she'd been hoping so desperately for a different outcome.

But she was a professional. She was professional and she was going to get through this.

She pulled in a slow, deep breath. Squared her shoulders. Had just opened her mouth to launch into her prepared business speech about the interview and what to expect when James looked up and his eyes locked onto hers.

'I read your email.'

Her breath fell out of her in a rush and she felt her shoulders slip forward as relief, overwhelming relief, washed over her. She didn't want to get too excited — she didn't even know what he thought about it yet — but this was something to hold onto and she _clung_ to it.

'You did?'

He nodded. 'The whole thing.'

And there was something about that, the way he'd phrased it, the final, heavy sort of way he'd said it, that made Lily's heart climb straight out of her chest and lodge itself in her throat.

He read her email. He read her email, her sad, pathetic, grovel-y email, and here he was standing in front of her with this look on his face and she had no idea what he was thinking. And she hated this, that she couldn't read him, and she hated that she couldn't tell if it was because he was keeping himself purposefully blank or if it was because, in their time apart, she'd forgotten how to read the subtle shifts in his face, the ones that had made him unreasonably easy for her to read.

She crossed her arms over her chest, her fingers starting to twist in the fabric of her shirt where James couldn't see. 'So… what did you think?'

She wanted to know so desperately, but she also couldn't help kicking herself a little bit once the words were out of her mouth. Did she really want to know what he thought about it? Did she really want him to start detailing all the awful things he'd thought about that fucking email? Did she want to know if he'd laughed and deleted it, or, worse, laughed and forwarded it to Sirius and _then_ deleted it?

She didn't want to know, but also she really, really did.

Even if it wasn't good she just — she needed to know.

He looked down at his feet for a moment to gather his thoughts, and Lily did her best to keep her mind from spinning out of control. When he looked up, there was a slight lift to the left side of his lips.

'I'm glad that you finally agree I was right.'

Her laugh fell out of her in a rush and James' smile bloomed across his face for one beautiful moment before it softened, pulled back.

'I'm glad you wrote it,' he said. He stuffed his hands into his trouser pockets and shifted his weight as he gathered his thoughts. 'I know that I'd been ignoring you, but I just — after the finale... I needed space. Everything was just so intense and all over the place and I couldn't think straight.'

'I didn't think you ever wanted to talk to me again.' She tried to make it sound casual, but the way her voice broke towards the end completely gave her away.

James laughed awkwardly and ran a hand through his hair. 'I didn't.'

Lily nodded slowly as she absorbed that.

'It was, as I think you said a dozen times in that email, "a lot".'

Lily nodded. 'No, I know. It's fair, it's just — tough to hear, I don't know.'

'You think that's tough, you should have heard the things Sirius said about you.'

'You know, I don't really need you to remind me that everyone hates me.'

James shook his head. 'He'll come round. He's just — he pretends he's cold and heartless and doesn't give a shit, but he's actually really protective of the people he cares about. And Mum and Remus have been talking him down, so that helps.'

'Did, uh — did Remus tell you? That he came to see me?'

James nodded. 'We had a bit of a row about it, actually, but I was mostly just being surly. He was right to do what he did and he knew that I knew it, so he didn't pay me much mind.'

'I'm sorry you had a row about me though.'

'It wasn't just about you. He'd been telling me for weeks to pull my head out of my arse and I was being stubborn and he was fed up with it.'

Lily couldn't think of anything to say to that.

She looked down at her shoes.

'Anyway,' James said, and Lily looked up.

He still looked a bit guarded, but there was an openness to his expression that hadn't been there a moment ago.

And Lily didn't mean for it to happen, but hope bloomed in her chest at the sight.

'We should probably talk about the rest of what you said.'

Lily took a deep, slow breath. She wanted to get this right, exactly right, but it was such a tricky thing to try and navigate and —

Maybe she should be less concerned about navigating it and just go with being honest.

'I meant every word,' she said. 'Every single word. James, I — I'm so sorry.'

James started to shake his head, but Lily cut across him. 'No, I am. I — that whole thing was a confusing fucking mess, but I didn't do anything to make it any better. We just kept having the same fight over and over again and we never got anywhere and —

'I've spent a lot of time over the last few months thinking about how things could have been different if I'd just let you quit the show. I still don't know how we would have weathered it, but we would have been together and… sometimes, I can't — maybe that would have been better.'

'I don't know,' James said. 'It — I mean, it's impossible to say, right, because we didn't get there. And it's not like you were wrong about the fallout. And then when I think about the stress and how easily everything just fucking crumbled while we were just on the show… Lily, I think we could have gotten through anything, but we wouldn't have gotten through it if we were going to be like we were.

'We weren't honest with one another. _Ever_. We were hiding our feelings all the time because we had to and you couldn't tell when I was being genuine with the contestants and when I wasn't and I was all tied up in my own guilt about the whole thing and — I don't know if we would have made it through _anything_ when we were like that.'

They were both quiet for a long moment, their eyes meeting briefly before they both looked down at their feet or at the door or anywhere else.

'I'm sorry, too,' James said.

Lily's head snapped up.

'I could have been more open with you. I could have told you how I felt right from the very beginning. But I was confused and a little terrified and, honestly, I kind of hoped it would just go away and then I'd spent so much time ignoring it... anyway, we both could have made different choices. If I could go back... god, I'd do everything differently.'

'Yeah,' Lily nodded. 'Me, too.'

She rocked back and forth on her heels for a moment before she took a tentative step forward. James, apparently not willing to wait for her to come to him, swooped forward, wrapped her in his arms, and pressed her to his chest.

And the walls in Lily's chest finally broke.

She pressed her nose into his t shirt and breathed him in, wound her fingers into the fabric by his shoulder blades and pulled him into her. She missed this, missed _him,_ the way he felt pressed up against her, the way he smelled, the way his body felt underneath her hands. She ran her hands slowly down his back as she pulled away, let them settle on his hips as she looked up at him.

'Talk more after?' James asked. She was surprised, though she probably shouldn't have been, at the note of uncertainty in his voice.

Lily nodded vigorously, 'Definitely,' before she stepped back into him for one last hug.

* * *

 **I decided to be nice and stop reading _Lethal White_ long enough to edit a second chapter for you guys today**

 **And seriously like, it has been so hard to pull my nose out of this book, you guys. It's truly a testament to how much I love you**


	40. Chapter 39

**See you next week!**

* * *

When she left James' dressing room a few minutes later, it was like a light had been injected straight into her chest. She was feeling better than she had in months, and though nothing was really fixed between them, not yet, the opportunity for fixing them was now on the table.

She bustled about for the next few hours, checking in with Marlene to see if she needed anything, nudging Mary towards the craft services table to remind her to eat, and though people seemed to notice that Lily was lighter than she'd been that morning, no one did more than send her a knowing smile.

Lily got a bit more nervous as the live crowd started rolling in — the excited buzzing of the crowd filled the set and Lily could barely think through the noise. These were dedicated fans, people who were desperate to find out exactly how the show had ended and would, probably, have very strong opinions about it. She regretted, now, that she hadn't spent more of her time in James' dressing room talking him through everything that was going to happen once everyone realised how the finale ended.

The first hour of the show was manageable — they played the finale episode through for the audience and Marlene made some light commentary in between scenes — but as they neared the end of the episode, as they neared what was supposed to be the proposal, Lily felt the anxiety start to claw its way into her throat. The crowd was noticeably excited — they'd really edited this episode up so that the final moments would be a complete shock — and Lily was increasingly desperate to text Mary and have her tell James to get the fuck out of there before they had a full scale riot on their hands.

James knew what he was getting into, coming here tonight, but it didn't mean that she wanted him to have to sit through what was probably going to be the most painful interview of his life.

When they finally got to the proposal scenes, Lily couldn't breathe.

The audience started chattering excitedly when Summer walked off the set, a few people started chanting 'Liza, Liza, Liza,' when Liza walked into the observation deck a moment later.

When James sent Liza home, too, you could have heard a pin drop.

The angry rustling started when the camera flicked on back in the studio and Marlene announced that James would be joining them after their break. It got louder and louder while the adverts rolled and, by the time that James walked out onto the set for his interview, the anger had reached such a pitch that a number of people booed him at the top of their voices.

James just smiled awkwardly at Marlene as he settled into his seat.

'Not the warm welcome you were hoping for, was it?' Marlene asked.

James shrugged, but, thankfully, not in a dismissive way. 'It was about what I expected and more than I deserved.'

'So let's jump right into it, then. My first question, obviously, is about what we just watched. Was there a reason you decided not to choose anyone that last night in London?'

James took a deep breath. 'Obviously, I knew that this was something we were building towards, my relationships with the women on the show, so it wasn't some fear of commitment that kept me from proposing that last night. I — I went on this show intending to find a serious relationship, a partner that I could stand beside for the rest of my life. And while Liza and Summer are amazing women, I just don't think that our relationship, our partnership, would have been the best for either of us.'

The audience started muttering angrily again and Marlene waited for them to settle down before she continued. 'Was it a matter of not feeling like you knew them well enough to take such a serious step?'

James shook his his head. 'It just wasn't there for me with them. I didn't get — you know that feeling in your gut that you get when someone's right? When everything is just _better_ because they're around? I didn't have that with Summer or Liza. They're some of the best people that I know and I know that they're going to make someone very happy, but that man, unfortunately, isn't me.'

'Fair enough, but —' Marlene said, and the crowd started to boo over her. She shot them a brief look before she turned back to James.

'You did seem pretty committed to _someone_ throughout most of that episode. Was that all just for the cameras or did something change?'

Lily knew that Marlene wasn't asking him to put undue pressure on him, especially knowing what she did about the reality of everything that had gone on behind the camera, but it also wasn't something that she could just let lie.

James brushed a piece of hair out of his eyes. 'I just — it's hard to explain,' he said. He paused for a long moment and Lily was sure his mind was working on bloody overdrive. 'This is a really intense experience. Which can be great because it means that you get to know people really quickly and you learn a lot about them. But it's also really hard to get distance and I, I mean, I'm someone who needs my family and needs to talk things through, and so I was feeling particularly isolated without them. So when I was alone in my room before the proposal scenes, I sat down and tried to think about everything that they would have said to me, to try and give myself the perspective I felt like I needed.

'And I realised, by doing that, that even though they're both wonderful women and even though I could be happy with either of them, that the feeling I thought would be there — that feeling like you can't live without someone… it just wasn't there. And it didn't seem fair to walk out there and propose to someone knowing that I wasn't in it a hundred percent.'

Marlene nodded. 'But what would you say to people who think that you should have chosen someone at the end anyway? That you should've picked the person you thought you were most likely to be happy with and given the relationship a shot off camera?'

'I would say that those people have obviously never been in love if they think you can force it like that.'

The crowd booed him again, louder this time, and Marlene raised her hand and waited for them to fall silent before she turned back to James. 'It seemed like you had such a great connection with Liza and Summer, though. I know I was shocked when you decided to send both women home at the end of the series.'

'Like I said, it was a really tough decision. It wasn't one that I made on the fly or I just decided on overnight. I _did_ have a great connection with Liza and Summer, but the depth of feeling really just wasn't there for me. They're lovely people and we had a great time together, but I don't know that we could have built a life on that.'

'Well, why don't we take a moment to look back over some of the series' biggest moments and see if we can start to understand how you came to your conclusion in the finale.'

James nodded and shifted in his seat so that he could see the screen where they'd be airing the reel. 'Alright, sure.'

The reel started out predictably enough — shots of James on the beach with Summer in Greece, walking hand in hand across a glacier with Liza in Iceland. It was a summary of two relationships that looked, to everyone outside them, to be perfectly sweet. Perfectly viable. It was hard to look at them now, as they'd been presented to the audience, knowing what Lily knew about the reality behind everything they'd filmed.

Greece, maybe, was real, but Iceland certainly hadn't been. Not in the way it had seemed to be. Not if what James had told her was true.

It was all already so difficult to watch, but then Lily saw her own face, and her blood ran cold.

Laughing, her hand on his arm, as they walked down to the beach in Santorini. Her hand on his knee in the car. Sitting on the end of his bed in Barcelona. James watching her over Claire's shoulder in Paris. James sleeping on her shoulder in the car. James holding her hands on the steps outside his parents' house.

Moments she hadn't realised the cameras had caught. A few she hasn't even noticed herself at the time.

It was a minute, maybe ninety seconds, but that was all it took for everything in her world to catch on fire.

She could feel the tide in the room shifting, the anger turning into outrage the longer it went. Marlene was talking rapidly into her microphone, her face set, and though Lily could hear it over her own headset — 'Turn it off, somebody fucking cut the reel, cut it now!' — it wasn't registering.

This was it. Everyone was finding out about them. It was over.

When she finally pulled her eyes away from the screen, it was to look at James. To watch him watching them. To watch him remembering. He must have felt her eyes on him because his eyes flicked away from the screen almost immediately and found hers.

And, god, she — _god._

She wanted to walk onto that stage right now and take his hand, walk him away from the set, the audience, walk him out of the building and just keep going, just keep walking until they got onto the tube, keep walking until they got to her flat and they could shut the door behind them and shut out the world. She wanted to disappear, fall off the fucking grid, so that she didn't have to watch their lives collapsing outside. She wanted to pretend that everything was going to be fine, or, at the very least, like it wasn't even happening.

She knew that she couldn't do that, but it didn't stop her from wanting it desperately.

She knew that she couldn't do that, and wanting it as desperately as she did meant that she needed to do some serious damage control to stop herself doing just that.

And then, somehow, it was worse. It was her and James on the observation deck, her yelling at him about sending both of the contestants home and James reminding her that he'd said he couldn't do this —

And then it cut, it cut on James' desperate, 'Lily, I —' and it didn't matter that he hadn't said it because the suggestion was all anyone really needed.

 _Lily, I —_

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath that was, admittedly, a weak attempt at steadying herself. When she opened them again, James was looking at Marlene and Marlene was, for the first time in Lily's memory, sitting completely silent on the stage despite the fact that the cameras were now tuned back to her.

Lily could hear Peter shouting directions over the radio, but Lily wasn't processing them. She was watching Marlene, waiting to see what she would do.

Lily knew that Marlene hadn't had anything to do with the video — had known from the way she'd reacted when Lily appeared on the reel, but would have known even if Marlene had managed to keep her cool. Marlene was — Lily trusted her with her life. Marlene wouldn't. She _wouldn't._

But she really needed to say something or this was going to get even worse.

'Mar.' Lily pressed the button on her radio and Marlene's head turned slightly towards her as she spoke. 'Just — you have my permission. Do what you need to do, the damage is already done.'

Lily knew that Marlene would have fought her on it, but, sitting on national television as she was, she didn't exactly have a choice just then.

She turned to look back at James, the shock evident on both of their faces.

'So, James,' Marlene's voice shook just a bit and she cleared her throat, wound her fingers together in her lap in a way that told Lily she was trying to steady them. 'That was a bit of a surprise.'

'Yeah,' James ran a hand through his hair and shifted a bit awkwardly in his seat. 'I definitely didn't expect to see some of that footage there.'

'How would you explain some of the things that we just saw?'

Lily could tell that Marlene was treading as carefully as she possibly could, to ask the questions that needed to be asked from the audience's perspective without throwing her and James completely under the bus. It might work, _might,_ but it wasn't going to take a lot of hedging for Marlene to completely lose the audience and set them against her.

And that was something that needed to be avoided at all costs.

Which meant that Marlene was going to have to drive the knife in just that much deeper if they had any hope of salvaging the situation.

'Well,' James was carefully measuring his words, making sure that he didn't say anything that could make the situation worse than it already was. 'It was hard seeing that footage with Summer and Liza. I'd forgotten how happy we used to look together.'

'But that footage at the end,' Marlene said, and she gave James a look that was clearly trying to communicate the fact that she was not trying to make this worse. 'How can you explain that?'

James cleared his throat. 'I'm not really sure how to explain that. I mean, L — she — that's my producer. She was my producer. That's —'

His eyes found Lily's again for just a moment before he turned his gaze back towards Marlene. Just a moment where he was begging her for an answer, for something to say that wouldn't make everything worse.

Trouble was, there wasn't anything he could say at this point that would make it better. It was just going to take time and silence and the public eventually finding someone else to hate. She knew that they might be able to get away with it if they kept up the lie, might be able to get out of this whole mess with James just looking a bit dodgy for refusing to pick someone in the end. On the other hand, though, Lily knew that if Peter had this, if he'd pulled this together and it hadn't gotten out, that it was likely that there would be other evidence that he would present at some point. He wouldn't come into this with nothing up his sleeve, wouldn't open up a controversy that he couldn't nail to someone completely.

She had no idea what the other shoe was going to be, but she was almost certain that it was going to drop.

So when James looked at her in that moment, Lily nodded and mouthed "tell them" — she wasn't sure if he understood what she wanted, with the distance between them and the studio lights shining in his eyes, but she didn't want him to lie for her, for them. It would mean that anything they might have fixed, any progress they might have made earlier that evening would have to stop, would mean that they couldn't talk, not publicly, that they couldn't see each other. It would mean that everything she'd let herself start hoping for the moment she'd left James' dressing room earlier that evening was now entirely off the table, but she couldn't see any other way out of this and, sometimes, you just have to go _through_ if you have any hope of making it out in one piece.

James looked back at Marlene. 'That's it.'

Marlene nodded. 'So you just had a close friendship with her?'

Lily could see the wheels turning in James' head, watched him piece together the least offensive sentence he could possibly think of.

'We... worked together prior to filming and were together almost constantly from the time that filming started up until we wrapped a few months ago. That kind of sustained contact means that you get really close to someone.'

It was killing him, this was. Killing him. Lily could see it on his face, in the two little lines that had carved themselves in between his eyebrows, in the stiffness in his posture, the way that his leg had stopped bouncing, how every single part of him had seemed to still.

'Well, we've got to break, but when we come back —' the audience started to boo and Marlene raised her voice to talk over them. 'When we come back, we'll be joined by a few of this season's most famous ladies.'

Marlene sat stock still on stage until the stage manager said, 'We're off' over the headset, then she reached back, switched her microphone off, and leaned towards James.

Lily couldn't hear what they were saying to one another, but then Marlene clicked on in Lily's ear and she turned in her seat to catch Lily's eye behind the cameras.

'Lil — what do you want us to do?'

'Can we just drop it when we're back from break? The papers will speculate, but if there's nothing more than rumours and some suspicious shots and that mildly incriminating finale bit, it should die down quickly enough?'

Marlene nodded. 'I'll do my best.'

Marlene leaned back over and said something to James before she sat up and turned her microphone back on. When she looked up, she caught Lily's eye again — Lily just shrugged, made an "it is what it is" kind of expression before Marlene slid into her camera smile and the cameras turned back on.

'Now, we're going to be joined by a few of this past year's most famous women — these are women who caught the public's eye and made quite a stir on the _Eligible_ set — let's watch.'

They rolled into another reel of highlights while Laura, Sarah, Victoria, and Rachel strode out onto the stage. James hopped up from the couch and slide into the free armchair on Marlene's right while the four women settled onto the couch.

They'd just finished getting settled when the cameras were back on them.

'Everyone,' Marlene said, 'let's welcome back Laura,' there was a smattering of applause and boos from the crowd, 'Sarah, Victoria, and Rachel!'

All four women smiled out at the crowd while they waited for the applause to die down.

'How have you four been doing since you left the show?'

'I have to say, Marlene,' Laura said, 'it's been so difficult coming to terms with the fact that I was pushed off the show in that _mad_ double elimination in Barcelona. Watching it back —' She put a hand to her chest and Lily grinned as Sarah visibly rolled her eyes on the sofa next to her. 'Watching it back was just so difficult.'

'Please,' Sarah apparently wasn't going to restrain herself and Lily was sure that Peter was shitting himself with excitement up in the gallery. 'You were awful. You should have been thankful that you stayed as long as you did.'

The audience laughed and Laura shook her long, blonde hair down her back. 'You just sound bitter to me, Sarah.'

Sarah raised an amused eyebrow. 'I left _after_ you. What the fuck would I have to be bitter about?'

'Okay,' Marlene held up her hands. 'Let's try and get back on track. Laura, we'll start with you since we're already here — you quickly gained a reputation as the series villain. Would you say that you deserved that title?'

The look on Marlene's face made it clear that she had an opinion on the matter, but her tone was as neutral as could be.

'Well,' Laura brushed a piece of hair out of her eyes, 'I first want to say that it's been so hard being hated by everyone when you've done nothing to deserve it —'

The crowd started muttering angrily and Rachel's jaw actually dropped.

'You almost broke my nose! What are you talking about, done nothing to deserve it!?'

'I still think that you just made that up, Rach,' Laura gave Rachel a simpering smile. 'I would never have tried to trip you.'

'So, Laura,' Marlene had on her most diplomatic voice and Lily couldn't help but be impressed because she probably would have outright guffawed on stage, 'you maintain that none of the things caught on camera actually happened?'

The crowd started muttering again as Laura smiled innocently back at Marlene, and Lily felt her heart rate start to settle back down a bit. People weren't likely to forget what they'd seen on James' reel a few minutes earlier, but giving them contestant drama right after was certainly going to distract them.

They could use the audience's distraction. If Marlene just refocused their attention onto this instead —

'I just think that the camera isn't always entirely truthful,' Laura said. 'Though there are some things that the camera did get right this season.'

Marlene frowned. 'And what was that?'

'Remember that producer Lily Evans we saw in the reel earlier? I know for a fact that James was having an affair with her.'

And there it was.

The other shoe.

Oh god.

Marlene had frozen on stage, but she recovered quickly.

'And how do you know this for a fact?'

A slow, awful smile spread across Laura's face. 'Because I have audio.'

Lily couldn't breathe.

'I —' Marlene's eyes had gone wide with shock and Lily could tell that she was racking her brain for something, _anything,_ to say, but ultimately, it didn't matter.

Laura turned to the camera and smiled her brightest smile. 'It should already be queued up if you want to give it a listen.'

Marlene didn't even have the chance to get the words out before the audio began.

 _Oh god._

It was —

Barcelona.

Oh my _fucking_ god.

They'd started with the fight — because of _course_ they had, why start anywhere else when you have them shouting at one another and making it perfectly clear just who's involved — but Lily could only catch snatches of it. Things would register every once and awhile — "isn't that what you're after" and "you signed a contract" and " _you know why I can't do that, Evans"_ — but for the most part, she was in shock. Total shock.

She could actually feel her organs shutting down.

And then, somehow, it got worse.

Because then, the studio, through the rustling of James' microphone as they pressed together, was full of the sound of what was undeniably a heated kiss.

She heard James groan, the one he'd made when he brought her lips back to his, the ones that had fallen out of him when she tugged his lower lip between her teeth. She heard her own heavy breathing and the sounds she'd made when James had moved to kiss her neck.

Lily's mobile started buzzing furiously in her back pocket.

When she lifted it up, she had a dozen notifications from Twitter. The screen just kept lighting up and refreshing, refreshing, refreshing, each time with a new notification, a new mention, and she just —

Her hands were shaking hard as she held down the lock button to shut off her phone and shoved it back into her pocket.

The audio finally stopped playing — it ended with the hard rap on the window and Lily shouting 'Thanks' to the driver and the sound of the door opening — and the studio was deadly silent.

But the silence didn't last long.

It started quietly, a few people testing it out to see if it would catch, but it was only a moment before the entire audience was booing and shouting in rage. James had dropped his head into his hands, Marlene was sitting, her mouth hanging open as she tried _desperately_ to think of something to say, and, in the middle of it all, Laura was sitting there with an absolutely brilliant smile on her face.

She leant over and whispered in James' ear and Lily just caught what she was saying though the microphone pinned to James' lapel —

'I told you you'd be sorry you let me go.'

James was pacing the length of his dressing room, hands buried in his hair when she walked in two hours later. She'd wanted to avoid it, had desperately just wanted to tuck and run out of the building, but she knew that it wasn't an option and she'd promised James she'd talk to him and —

She wasn't going to say anything that he wanted to hear, not now, not after that and everything had fucking exploded, but she couldn't just leave. Not after the absolute fucking train wreck that they'd just sat through.

James looked up as she shut the door behind her, his hands falling immediately to his sides as he stepped towards her.

'What are we going to do?'

'What do you mean what are "we" going to do? There's nothing we can do, James!'

She wasn't going to waste any time getting right to the point, apparently. She hated it, she hated that they were back here again, but what else was she supposed to do?

She had to distance herself from this. It was already terrible and it had only just begun and —

James stepped closer to her. 'Lily, come on there has to be —'

She probably should have stepped back, created space between them, but she couldn't bring herself to move.

Luckily, her tone sharpened to compensate.

'They just fucking ran a reel of us basically having an affair for the duration of the show! And Laura — _James._ '

James rolled his eyes and the gesture made her blood start to simmer. 'It's not a fucking affair, Lily, the whole premise of the damn show is that I'm dating multiple people at once.'

'Don't pretend like you think this is the same thing. Don't you honestly look me in the eyes and tell me you believe that.'

'Tell me how it's different.'

'James! It — it's _obviously_ different, I — I'm not an option. I wasn't a fucking option!'

'You were an option for me!'

'Well, the rest of the women on that damn show didn't know that, did they,' Lily snapped, 'so that wasn't very fucking fair.'

'Well, that didn't fucking stop you acting like you were an option, Lily. Tell me that I don't need to refresh your memory on all the things that _we_ ,' he gestured angrily between the two of them and Lily realised how close they were standing now, 'got up to over the last few months. Especially now that they were just splashed all over fucking national TV.'

'You don't need to tell me that I'm a terrible person, James,' Lily hissed, 'I've got my entire tenure on this fucking show to look back on whenever I need the reminder.'

'Oh my fucking god, Lily, enough with the martyr act! No one forced you to work for this show. No one forced you to stay!'

She laughed derisively. 'Except for the fact that I'm quite fond of eating and having a place to sleep, you mean.'

James raised his eyebrows at her. 'You couldn't have found something else? You don't honestly think that you would've found something else?'

'How could I leave until I had something else? Why would I throw myself off that cliff?!'

'You'd think you'd do anything if you truly hated it that much,' James snapped.

'Spoken like someone who never had to go to the fucking food bank with their mother to make sure they actually had something to eat.'

James didn't seem to have anything to say to that, but it wouldn't have mattered anyway because Lily just steamrolled on.

'You have no idea, _no idea_ , how much I thought about getting another job. You have no idea how I panicked every _single_ time I thought about leaving without a safety net, how I remembered my dad losing his job over and over again, and how every time he came home and said it was going to be better when he found the next thing and every time it was _worse_.

'The only thing that kept us from fucking sinking was my mother who did whatever job she could and went without dinner so her daughters would have enough to eat. She is the smartest, strongest person I know, and she did _everything_ she could to make sure we had food and fucking heating every winter because that was more important than whether or not she liked her job. So yeah, I might've fucking hated the work I was doing on this show, but I wasn't about to take a page out of my father's book and throw everything away before I knew where I was going. I wasn't going to fucking do that, James, not after everything my mother spent her entire life teaching me.'

Lily swiped angrily at the tears on her cheeks, gritted her teeth to try and settle her breathing. James was looking at her like he'd never looked at her before, like things were clicking into place in his head, like he was understanding her.

She wanted to hate it.

But she was too busy spiralling out of control in her own head, thinking about the fact that she'd already said she wasn't coming back — not that she'd be welcome back after this even if she _hadn't_ already quit — about the fact that she was, very likely, totally and completely fucking screwed.

How was she going to get a job after this? Where in the fuck could she go after this?

'Lily —'

Lily held up her hand, took a step back. 'Don't. Don't pity me.'

'I'm — Lily, I'm not, I — I had no idea.'

'I don't exactly walk around and announce it to everyone,' Lily snapped. 'It's not like I'm proud of it.'

James looked like he wanted to say something, but he closed his eyes for a moment, took a deep breath. When he spoke again, his tone was even, carefully measured.

'I'm sorry,' he said, and when he opened his eyes and found hers, Lily felt the familiar tug in her gut, the one that wanted her to step closer to him, to stop this before she drove them too far down the track.

But it was that feeling, that willingness to disregard everything that she knew, logically, that she should be doing that got them here in the first place. It was that, that fucking impulsiveness, that had given them the audio that had completely destroyed her career. Her _life_.

'I'm sorry for shouting and for making accusations without having the full story. But Lily,' he heaved a heavy sigh, and Lily felt the weight of it, felt just how exhausted he was. 'Can we _please_ just stop fighting about this? Can we just figure out what we're going to do?'

'I don't know why you think that this is something that can be fixed.'

'Because this will blow over. These kinds of things are bad at the time, but this will blow over. If we just show a united front —'

'For fucks sake, I already told you that there's no point in doing that!'

His composure, apparently, was on a very short thread these days.

'Why do you do that?!' he threw his hands up and the look on his face was so pained, so frustrated, that part of her wanted to back track. 'Why do you keep pushing me away?!'

'I'm not —'

'You are! We're in the same room for the first time in three months and things have gotten hard again and you're sober and you're scared and Remus isn't here to push you and you don't have anything to hide behind.'

'James —

'Tell me it isn't true. Tell me that email and everything we said earlier wasn't complete bollocks.'

He was begging her now. He was begging her.

'It was true, James, at the time. But things have changed and — '

'For fucks sake,' James raked a frustrated hand through his hair. 'Nothing's changed, Lily. We're still exactly where we were before. More people are just in on it now.'

'Oh my god,' Lily laughed derisively. 'You have no concept of how significant a difference that is, do you?'

James scoffed. 'Don't talk to me like I'm a child, Lily.'

'Then don't act like one! Act like you understand what it's going to be like when the entire country is against you, like you understand just how bad this fallout is going to be. Act like you fucking understand that I am going to be the one that suffers the most for this because I'm a homewrecking whore or whatever they're going to call me. Act like you _get it_ , James, and I won't talk to you like you're a goddamn child.'

She literally watched the fight drain out of him.

James sank down into the sofa behind him and stared at his knees and looking at him like that, seeing him like that — she wanted to take it all back. Take everything back. It wouldn't have done them any good and would have completely defeated the point she was trying to push, but she couldn't bear to look at him like that.

'Lily, just — ' James pressed his palms to his forehead for a moment before moving them up and raking his hands through his hair.

'Just go. Please, just — just go.'

Though she knew he wasn't looking, Lily nodded her head jerkily. 'Yeah,' she was mildly embarrassed by the crack in her voice. She took a breath, squared her shoulders. 'Yeah, alright. I — Bye.'

Though part of her wanted to stay, to demand that he talk to her about this, to beg him to help her fix this, to plead with him to understand where she was coming from, a larger part of her knew that it wasn't an option.

He'd asked her to leave. Forcing her company on him wasn't going to fix anything.

And anyway, isn't this exactly what she'd wanted?


	41. Chapter 40

**The hearings were really hard to watch yesterday, so I created the time for myself to do this so I would stop mulling over everything.**

 **I also want to shout out the Juan Mata interview on Russell Howard's show last year. It seriously inspired James' trajectory.**

 **Also, the beginning of this chapter might be a bit triggering: panic attacks, internet abuse, and misogyny all come into play here.**

 **Anyway - enjoy, my friends. I'll see you Sunday xx**

* * *

The next few months were, as Lily'd knew they'd be, some of the most difficult of her life.

She'd turned off push notifications the night the finale aired. Had set all her social media accounts to private. She finally stopped checking her Twitter mentions after a week or so of reading threats and insults that, sometimes, scared her so much she went into the bathroom to throw up. She stopped answering her mobile because it was only ever journos and she only went out to do the food shop and even then, she only went late at night and never at the same place because the paps had taken to following her.

It was everything that she'd known it would be, but that hadn't made it any easier to deal with.

The first time she had a panic attack, after a journalist had caught up with her at Tesco at one in the bloody morning when she'd thought she'd be fucking safe, she thought that she was dying. She had to be dying because her throat was closing up and she couldn't fucking breathe and she felt like she was going to throw up but she was standing in the middle of the fucking freezer aisle in Tesco and she couldn't fucking throw up in public, not when she knew that she was already going to see her face on the front of something tomorrow with a headline that said something like _Disgraced Producer Can't Even do a Bloody Food Shop!_ and so she'd just run out, abandoning her trolley full of food, and run through that gate in the brick wall along the pavement and sank down into the cool grass and dropped her head between her knees.

She did throw up, but she managed to get it into the grass next to her instead of all down herself, and so, an hour later, when she thought that the journalist might have gone, she was able to run back into Tesco and grab milk and teabags and a box of Wheetabix so that she had something to eat to get through the week.

The next few times she had a panic attack weren't any easier, but at least she knew what to expect.

A few weeks after the finale, Liza went on one of the breakfast shows and said she hoped that James and Lily were able to find happiness together.

She implored everyone to leave them alone.

Lily's mentions were an absolute bloodbath that day, but she went onto Twitter to DM Liza and thank her.

She really hadn't deserved that. That support. And Liza was just so bloody wonderful and after everything they'd put her through —

Liza said she probably should have known anyway.

 _And from the way he looked at you in that video they showed,_ she'd said, _I think we ALL should've known._

In the wake of the fall out from _The Audio,_ Marlene left _Eligible_ to "focus on her own show and other creative endeavours". Peter, apparently, had been completely livid, but Lily had never known Marlene to care less about what someone thought about her. It was about ethics, Marlene said, about the principle of the damn thing, and she just couldn't carry on at a show where they didn't believe in treating people with basic human decency.

Lily believed Marlene when she said that she had no idea that that audio was coming.

She accepted when Marlene asked her to be the new lead producer on her show.

It had been absolute mayhem for a while. For Marlene. People started tweeting at her, tweeting at the show account, that they couldn't believe Marlene would hire such an untrustworthy cunt to work on the show, and after what she'd done to the contestants, did she really even deserve a job, and Marlene had tweeted something back at each and every one of them before she blocked them and then, in Lily's first week on the show, she did a segment on misogyny and internet bullying even though she _knew_ that that was just going to piss off the people online even more. Lily couldn't even _begin_ to find the words to say what Marlene's support meant to her, but Marlene wasn't interested in hearing it anyway.

'Nonsense,' Marlene had said when she walked into Lily's office after that show and found her sobbing incoherently about how she didn't deserve this opportunity and she was certainly going to sink this show and Marlene would never forgive her for it.

Marlene has sat down next to Lily on the sofa and pulled her immediately into a hug and said, 'Nonsense. You're fucking brilliant. If anyone deserves an opportunity, it's you. Fuck those ignorant twats, anyway.'

Marlene…. She really had been invaluable.

Months passed. They passed in a haze of tears and death threats and, before she realised she should probably stop with them before she _really_ became her father, bottles of wine. It never got easier to read some of the things people wrote to her, they never stopped making her feel queasy, but, eventually, she stopped reacting.

She started to let things just roll off her back. And even when she wasn't entirely successful, the intent, she thought, was progress enough.

She finally got in to see a therapist.

Lily still got threatening emails to her work address from time to time, still got people on Twitter telling her that they hoped she would get hit by a bus (and that the was on the nicer end of the spectrum), but for the most part, as time went on (and people found other things to focus on), her life settled down into something that vaguely resembled normalcy.

Except for the part where James absolutely hated her.

She wasn't proud of it, never even talked about it (and in the midst of everything else going on in her life, nobody pressured her about it), but she would be lying if she said that she wasn't at least kind of keeping tabs on him as the months passed. He'd gone underground for a while, hadn't tweeted or Instagrammed or given interviews, but a few months ago, he'd started floating back into the public eye, almost like he was testing the waters. It was just print interviews and discussions on chat shows, nothing that required him to actually appear on screen. She'd been waiting for people to snap at him, to start dragging him again, and there was some of that (there was always some of that), but he'd come back into the world with a charity foundation and a team of footballers at his back and, really, who was going to attack a man that was now making his career doing charity work?

When Lily was being truly honest with herself, she knew that really only _half_ of that sentence was actually necessary.

She saw him again, for the first time in a year, completely unexpectedly. She'd given up checking his social media about two months earlier (he still never posted anyway and so there was no point), and had started running through this narrative in her head about how it was time to move on already, when she'd sat down on her couch one night in early November to watch Marcus Brandon, and, about halfway through the programme, had nearly had a stroke.

James was the fucking guest spot.

And she knew that she should probably switch it off, should find an old _Dinner Date_ or _East Enders_ or literally anything else, but —

She was anxious all through the adverts just before the interview started, brewed herself a cup of tea, grabbed a packet of ginger nuts from the back of the cupboard, and curled up on the couch, cushion tucked between her knees. Her hands were trembling a bit in anticipation, she burnt her damn lip when she tried to take a sip before her tea was a proper drinking temperature, and despite the fact that she felt like she was freaking the _fuck_ out as the last advert came to a close and she pushed her elbow a bit harder into the pillow, she started to feel like she was getting her feet back under her.

Sort of.

'Our guest this week,' Marcus said, a wide smile on his face when he reappeared on screen, 'you might know as the former Chelsea centre-forward who _dominated_ on the 2014 national squad or from last year's dramatic series of _Eligible_ on uTV. He's here tonight to talk with us about what he's been up to since leaving the pitch — James Potter, everyone!'

The crowd exploded into applause and James walked out from behind the screen at the back of the set.

And fucking hell if he didn't look every bit as good as she remembered. He was wearing a dark, emerald green jumper and jeans and trainers and _god_ he just — he was so fucking handsome it was almost unbearable to look at him.

He shook Marcus' hand when he reached him in the centre of the stage, clapped a hand on his back, and they exchanged a few words before James settled into the chair opposite Marcus, crossing one leg over the other.

'So,' Marcus smiled warmly at James, 'how've you been feeling? You've had an insane year this last year.'

James laughed, ran his hand through his hair, and Lily felt a lump in her throat at the familiar sight. 'Other than blowing my knee out and the internet hating me for the last few months or so, I've been alright.'

He flashed a bright grin as the audience laughed.

'So let's actually talk about your time on _Eligible_ for a minute — '

'We really don't have to.'

The audience laughed again and Marcus grinned as he leaned forward in his chair a bit. 'What was it that inspired you to go on that kind of show in the first place? It seemed like such a random thing to do, and I know that a lot of your teammates were surprised you'd agreed.'

James sighed heavily. 'Honestly, and I know that it sounds like I'm lying based on the way that the show turned out, but I went on to find a relationship. They'd recruited me on, as everyone now knows, and so that was part of it, but I wouldn't have done it if I honestly didn't think that it could work.'

'So then how do you explain leaving the show without choosing anyone? A lot of people were pissed off about that.'

James scrubbed his hand through his hair, his brow furrowed just a touch, so subtly that she wouldn't have noticed it if she didn't know his face so well. 'You know when you're in love, mate. You can just _feel_ it. Everything's different and the world's better and you'd do anything for that person just because you want to see them smile. I care about Liza and Summer, I genuinely do, they're amazing people, but I didn't feel that way about them. It felt wrong to pick one of them knowing that I felt the way I did.'

Marcus nodded, and Lily was relieved to see that he looked satisfied with James' answer. 'Fair enough. One last question about this and then we'll move on — was your relationship with your producer part of the reason that you didn't develop serious feelings for the women on the show?'

Lily stopped breathing.

And it looked like James had, too.

He dropped his gaze to his knees before, after a beat of silence, he looked up and nodded slowly. 'Yeah. Most of it, you know, was that, as wonderful as they were, I just don't think I fit with anyone that was on the show. I met some truly amazing people and anyone they end up with will be so, so lucky to be with them, but — '

She could see him weighing his words, trying to figure out what he should say. There was probably so much swirling around in his head, the set of his jaw and creases between his eyebrows told her as much, but she knew that he wouldn't want to give it all up, not when so much of what had happened between them still felt personal, despite the fact that so much of it had been dragged through the media since last November.

'Lily's special,' he said at last. 'She's brilliant and I've never met anyone like her. And I know the internet thinks we just started some sleazy affair or whatever, but Lily's… it was more than that. She's more than that.'

He looked past Marcus then, into the camera, and Lily would have sworn that he was looking straight at her.

'Now,' Marcus leaned back in his chair, relaxed his posture a bit, 'time for an easier question — how much do you miss football?'

'Fuck,' James breathed a laugh and Lily watched the tension flood out of his shoulders, 'I miss it so much.'

'I can imagine.'

'My whole life was football. I started playing when I was five and I've played ever since. That moment, you know, when you realise that you're going to play professionally —' James shook his head incredulously. 'It was everything that I'd ever wanted for myself. I spent all my time thinking about how the next ten or twenty years of my life were going to look and building my life around the expectation that I'd be on the pitch. So then to have my career end so suddenly — I could have carried on with it, after the surgery, I could have played, but I wouldn't have been the same player, and so I made the decision to just cut my losses instead of going back to my club and playing like shit — when my career ended like that? It was heartbreaking. It was like watching my entire life crumble in front of my eyes.'

James looked down at his knees and was quiet for a moment, and Marcus seemed keen to indulge him. After a minute, James looked up. 'I didn't know who I was without football.'

'So that's the thing, how do you carry on when something like that happens? Was it important for you to maintain a connection to football or did you need some distance for a while?'

'Both, definitely both. I needed to get out of my own head for a while, do something different with my life. I couldn't watch football last season, didn't watch _any_ , haven't played FIFA in ages,' the audience laughed and James smiled before he continued. 'Every time that I let myself think about playing, it came back to my injury, and then I was depressed all over again. But once I got over it, as much as you _can_ get over it, I had to think about what my relationship with football was going to be like, because, you know, it's my entire life. It still is, even now that I'm not on the pitch. I love it. And so that's where my work with Future FC has come in.'

Marcus grinned. 'Tell us about Future FC, because the work that you're doing is genuinely amazing.'

James tipped his head, a wide smile on his face. 'Ah, thank you, but really, I can't take all the credit, because we're working with football charities around the world that are doing great things in their communities. My job is to help bring awareness to these organisations and raise money to fund the work that they do.'

'So you've been running a lot of fundraisers recently, but you're also trying to get players to pledge some of their salary to the fund.'

James nodded. 'Yeah, we're asking footballers to donate at least one percent of their salary, some players have donated more, like Hope Scott, and that's just so amazing, I seriously can't thank her enough. Our lives, as footballers, but also as fans, have been completely shaped by the game, and I've seen the kind of work that this game can do. Football is a tool to bring people together — it creates communities and inspires us to work towards our goals and helps us connect with people that we might otherwise have nothing in common with. It might just be a game, but football can absolutely change lives, and that's why I think that the work Future FC is doing is so important.'

'What kinds of organisations does Future FC support?'

'We've built a network of over a hundred organisations across the globe, India, Colombia, Germany, all over. They're grassroots charities that tackle all kinds of issues — social inequality, refugee integration in Europe, peacebuilding — we're funding the work that people in these communities have started, because we know that they're the best equipped to give their communities what they need. So rather than us, you know, stepping in and saying, "Here's what we think you need," we work with people that live in these communities themselves, people that have seen the need where they live, and figured out how to start addressing it.'

'That's really powerful work, mate, well done.' The audience applauded, and, while James nodded his thanks, Lily watched as he smiled and ducked his head a bit sheepishly.

'So,' Marcus said, as soon as the applause settled, 'last question. We know that you had to keep something of a strict diet while you were playing football, so what was the first thing that you ate as soon as you decided you were done?'

James started laughing, that loud, boisterous laugh she loved so much. 'Who've you been talking to? Has my brother talked to you?'

Marcus grinned. 'Might've done, who's to say.'

James shook his head. 'He's a dead man, I tell you. A dead man.'

Marcus just smiled back at him and James sighed. 'As you apparently already know,' James said, biting back a smile, 'I went on something of a carbs binge after I decided to leave Chelsea. I went to a bakery down the road from my flat and bought… I don't know, maybe one of everything that they sold in the shop. I ate most of it before I started to feel, you know, kind of gross, but then I just kept eating because it was all so damn good.'

The audience laughed and James shot them all a look. 'It wasn't very funny when I was lying on my bathroom floor an hour later calling my brother to tell him that I was dying.'

The audience laughed again and James shot them all a wry smile. After a few final comments and one last shot of James smiling warmly into the camera, the show went to commercial and Lily grabbed her mobile from the sofa beside her. She knew that if she waited she was going to talk herself out of it, and she refused to let her personal terror cloud her professional judgment.

Marlene picked up on the second ring.

'How're you, Lils?'

'Are you watching Marcus Brandon?'

Marlene laughed and Lily heard her banging around over the line. 'No, why?'

'James just gave an interview and Mar — ' she paused, sighed. 'Mar, we've _got_ to book him for the show.'


	42. Chapter 41

**Happy Sunday!**

* * *

Where the build up to the _Eligible_ finale had been full of terror and confusing anticipation, the lead up to James' appearance on Marlene's show, set to be just a fortnight after his appearance on Marcus Brandon, was surprisingly quiet in comparison.

There was some concern on the part of James' publicist that putting him on Marlene's show would remind people about the whole debacle last year, and, for a while, it looked like she might not agree for him to come on, but his publicist called Lily late one Thursday afternoon and said that she was willing to let James come onto the show despite her concerns.

Lily wasn't sure what changed her mind, but she wasn't about to question it.

Marlene hovered a bit more those few weeks — lingering in Lily's office longer and longer after they finished taping, inviting Lily out with her and Dorcas on what Lily was sure were supposed to be dates. She appreciated it, Lily did, but she didn't feel like she needed to be watched and coddled.

So James was coming on the show. She was fine with it.

Was it going to be easy seeing him for the first time in a little over a year? No. But she was going to get through it.

On the morning of the interview, Lily woke up earlier than she'd intended, just jolted awake in the middle of a dream she immediately forgot. She made a cup of tea, then another, then another, and paced around the flat for a few hours before she finally snapped, dug her trainers out from the bottom of the wardrobe, and went on a run.

She ran flat out for most of it, ran like she was trying to outrun something. It was like Iceland all over again and that thought alone made her feel sick.

It seemed to have helped, though, because by the time she was walking back up the stairs to her flat half an hour later, her muscles aching and her heart still pounding hard against her ribs, she was calmer than she'd been before she'd left.

She was still a _little_ anxious, was still playing scenes in her head to try and decide what it would be like to see him again, but she'd burned off the top layer of her anxiety and the bits that were left were quieter and easier to ignore.

Okay, so she might have mulled over them a bit in the shower, but, really, she was just doing what her therapist always told her to do, to acknowledge her feelings, and by the time she was dressed and walking down to the tube station an hour later, her feelings had been successfully acknowledged and safely relegated to the back of her mind.

She read through her emails on the train on the way in, forwarded a job post to Mary ( _if you're ready for something a bit more than PA life, why don't you give this a shot? I think you'd be a great fit (also I'm happy to be a reference if you'd like) xx_ ), responded to a few other emails about upcoming guests. By the time she was getting off the train in Waterloo, she felt like she was ready.

As ready as she could be, anyway.

The next few hours flew by — she went over the schedule with the team, checked on the final corrections the graphics team had made to the short reel they'd show during James' interview, caught shit from the crew for bothering to put on eyeliner and wear her hair down, talked through lighting changes with Eoin while she had her PA, Alix, checking on the dressing rooms. There were small fires — not enough water bottles on stage, the switch for the game board wasn't working properly again — but more water bottles were found and Musa was able to re-wire the board and by the time Alix was calling for Lily on the radio, everything seemed to be in order.

Lily unclipped her radio from her hip. 'Go for Lily.'

'Potter just arrived.'

Fuck. She wasn't ready for this. She wasn't ready, she wasn't ready, she wasn't ready.

She put a smile on her face and hoped Alix could hear it in her voice. 'Great, thanks. Heading over there now.'

Her stomach bottomed out as she walked off the set, down the long corridor towards the guest dressing rooms. She hesitated on the other side of his door for a second, squared her shoulders, and told herself that it didn't matter that her heart had clawed its way into her throat because she was a professional and she was going to be just fine.

Nevermind the fact that she now found herself thinking about the last time that she'd been in one of James' dressing rooms.

This was not the same moment. She shouldn't judge James or this moment or herself against the last time.

She knocked twice on the door, two short, sharp knocks, and waited.

When he opened the door —

She was _not_ going to be fine.

James looked even better than she remembered. Even better than he'd looked on Marcus Brandon.

He was wearing another jumper, a dark, rusty red this time, another pair of dark wash jeans, and trainers, and _god_ if she didn't want to peel it off him layer by layer and run her hands over every single centimetre of his skin.

He only looked taken aback for a second, just long enough that Lily noticed it, but he recovered quickly. 'Hi. I, uh.' He cleared his throat. 'I was wondering when I'd see you.'

Lily did her best to smile. 'Right now.'

James breathed a laugh, brushed a piece of hair back off his face. 'Uh, d-do you need me? For something, I mean?'

Lily cleared her throat, shook her head. 'No. Just wanted to check and make sure you've got everything.'

He nodded. 'Yeah. Yeah, I'm good, thanks.'

'Oh, uh, great. Well, I'll leave you to it, then. Call will be in about an hour, so —'

'Okay.'

Lily took a deep breath and hoped to _god_ that he didn't hear how shakey it was. 'Okay, great. Just — Alix,' Lily turned over her shoulder like Alix would be standing there. When they weren't, she whipped back around.

'Alix is my PA. If you need anything and you don't see me, just shout for them and they'll get you whatever you need.'

James nodded, but it didn't really seem like he was paying attention anymore. His eyes were moving slowly over her face, over the curve of her cheek, down the line of her neck, and there was something about the look on his face. He looked like he was remembering something and she was already tying herself in knots to keep from asking what he was thinking about.

She wanted to know, she really, _really_ wanted to know, but now was really not the time.

Lily sucked in a sharp breath and when she spoke, her voice was high and breathy and not at all hers. 'Okay, uh, bye.'

James jolted a bit and his eyes moved back to hers. He held her gaze for a moment and Lily felt her heart start pounding desperately in her chest again.

'Bye.'

She turned on her heel before he even shut his dressing room door and all but sprinted down the corridor.

Lily wasn't sure, looking back, how she made it through the next hour knowing that James was only a few walls away from her for the first time in a year. She remembered being obsessively nervous, remembered Alix telling her over and over again to breathe, but everything else seemed like a blur.

Once she got herself behind her podium, she gripped the ever-loving shite out of the wood to make sure that she didn't fall over and did her best to forget that James was even in the building.

James Potter who?

'Tonight's guest was a world-class centre-forward for Chelsea — he played for the 2014 national squad, scored one of our two goals that go round,' Marlene paused as the audience laughed and her smile widened.

'Since leaving the pitch two years ago, he's turned his attention to how he could use football to improve the lives of people all over the world. Tonight, he's here to talk about that effort — please welcome James Potter!'

James walked smoothly out from behind the curtain as the audience burst into applause. If anyone realised that Marlene had completely neglected to mention the fact that she and James had spent a year working together on _Eligible_ , no one seemed to mind the omission. The applause was loud and long, and James stood in front of his chair for a moment, waving out at the audience, before he finally settled in and the applause drew to a close.

'James.' Marlene smiled as she settled into her chair. 'How are you?'

James grinned. 'I'm spectacular, how are you?'

'Great. At the risk of dredging up any hard feelings, I am happy to see you again.'

'It's been a while, hasn't it?'

Marlene nodded. 'It has.'

'I have to say, I much prefer seeing you in this context.' James grinned at her and Marlene laughed.

'You know, I think I have to agree.'

They talked for a while about James' foundation — what motivated it, how he was getting the word out, what kind of work they were already doing around the world. When they reached the end of the interview, Marlene leaned forward a bit in her seat and smiled at James.

'Now, you don't have to answer this last question if you don't want,' Marlene said, and Lily watched James brace his hands nervously against the arms of the chair he was sitting in, 'but, enquiring minds want to know — are you seeing anyone at the moment? There was a rumour a few months ago that you and Sadie Cohen were going out.'

James laughed and shook his head. 'No. I swear, you get dinner with a woman and all of a sudden —'

The audience laughed and James just smiled at Marlene while they settled down. 'Sadie joined up with Future after she left Arsenal at the end of last season. We've been spending a lot of time together, doing promotional shoots and things like that because, you know, old club rivals on the pitch doesn't mean a damn thing when you're trying to do good work.'

The audience applauded and James looked right at Lily when they finished.

'But to answer your question, Marlene — I'm totally and completely single.'

She wasn't sure if she was within bounds, going back to his dressing room after the interview, but she couldn't quite help herself after that.

Especially if him looking at her and announcing to the world that he was single was the sign that she thought that it was.

And maybe he wouldn't have anything to say to her, he probably wouldn't, not after the last time had been… what it was, but she at least wanted to extend the olive branch. She needed to at least let him know that all the old feelings — the anger and the terror and the confusion — had all melted away since they'd last seen one another. That time (and a therapist and a social media ban) had really given her perspective.

She knocked on James' door and smiled awkwardly up at him when he opened it.

'Hey. Can we talk?' She hadn't meant to blurt it all out like that, but she supposed that was better than not saying it at all.

'Uh, yeah.' James cleared his throat. 'Sure.'

He stepped back to make room for her to walk into his dressing room and she hesitated.

'I — I meant — not here?'

James' brow furrowed. 'Oh. Where did you mean?'

'I mean, wherever really. I just — I work here and there's a lot I want to say to you and I don't know if I'll be able to say it here. Because someone could overhear or we could start shouting — '

James' frown deepened. 'Do you think we'll start shouting?'

Lily shrugged. 'I don't know. We're kind of loud whether we're shouting or not.'

James breathed a soft laugh. 'I suppose that's true.'

'Though,' Lily brushed a piece of hair back out of her face, looked down at her feet, 'I didn't have another place in mind, so maybe we could just —'

'We could go to yours? If you want.'

Lily's head snapped up. 'What?'

'Only if you want to,' he said, his tone slightly panicked now. 'I don't want you to think I'm like — I don't know. Just — it's private and you'd definitely feel comfortable there and I don't mind. If you don't mind.'

They looked at each other in silence, trying to read one another. It was harder for her to read him than she remembered it being — he was more guarded now, more closed off. Every expression was carefully moderated and though he sometimes slipped, like earlier when she watched his eyes go dark as he traced them over her face, right now, his expression was more even than it should be, especially given the slight panic in his speech a few moments before.

She hated that she couldn't read him anymore, that he felt like he needed to shield himself around her. She understood why, but it cut something deep in her.

James cleared his throat.

'I think you're right,' he said, and Lily must have looked confused because he clarified.

'We need to talk. I have some things I've been wanting to say to you, too, I just —' He hesitated as he tried to find the right words. 'I didn't work up the courage earlier.'

She nodded. 'I barely worked up the courage just now.'

The smallest smile hitched at the corner of his lips before he smoothed it back down. It was pathetic how much that hint made Lily's heart hurt.

'But alright,' she said. 'If you're sure that you don't mind, we can go to mine. Do you want to go together or?'

James nodded. 'Together is fine. I've never been to your flat, so…'

'Right. Well, uh,' she checked her watch, 'just give me like, five minutes to grab some things out of my office?'

'Alright. I'll just,' he cleared his throat, 'get myself together. I'll meet you here or in the lobby?'

'Here is fine. But if you want to go to the lobby —'

'No, I'll wait here if that's easier for you.'

'Alright. If you're sure.'

James nodded. 'I'm sure.'

'Uh, okay. Well, I'll be back in five minutes, then.'

'Okay.'

Lily turned around a bit faster than was probably necessary, started making her way down the corridor towards the lifts. She tried to keep her expression even, to reel in the wide, stupid smile on her face, but it was no good.

James was coming back to her flat.

James was going to talk to her.

It didn't matter that most of the things she was planning to say were going to be difficult, didn't matter that nothing she had to say was going to fix any of the things that they'd done to each other — well, it _did_ matter, but they couldn't go back and fix all of those things anyway.

And, really, there was no point in going back. There was nothing to be gained from whinging about what they wish they'd done or how they wished things had gone because they hadn't done those things and things hadn't gone that way. Things had happened the way they'd happened and there was no sense in carrying on berating themselves and one another for that. Their time would be much better spent airing their feelings, making it clear where they stood, and, if James was interested, figuring out how to move forward. This conversation wasn't going to be any easier than the one the year before would have been had it gone properly, but the whole thing, cast in this light, felt different. And, crucially, she felt ready for it now.

It was amazing what a difference that made.

It made it easier for her to ignore the nerves crackling in her stomach as she unlocked her office door and slid things off her desk into her bag, made it easier to steady her shaking fingers as she tried to relock her door. The nerves were still there, nearly overpowering, as she headed back down and met James outside his dressing room, but the thing about being ready was that it made it easier for her to push through them.

What she'd always read as a sign to cut her losses, to tuck and run, she now just recognised as a sign that this was important to her. There were stakes, real stakes here, and she wanted to get it right.

Even if getting it right meant that they were nothing more than friends or, maybe, nothing at all — no matter what the outcome, she needed him to know where she'd been, needed to know why she'd done the things she'd done.

She needed to apologise, really apologise, and she needed him to know that she meant it.

Lily smiled when she as she got out of the lift and spotted James leaning up against the wall outside his dressing room. 'Ready?'

James nodded and pushed up off the wall. 'Ready.'

They took the lift down to the lobby and started out onto the pavement in silence. Lily bit back a smile when they both, simultaneously, reached up to tighten their coats around themselves as they stepped into the chilly December air, but otherwise, she kept her head down against the wind.

They took the bus to Holborn and then the Central line train out to Leytonstone. When the weather was nicer, Lily usually walked to the tube station, but tonight was colder than it'd been of late and she really didn't feel like dragging James along through the cold any longer than necessary.

'I forgot that you live all the way out here,' he said, a ghost of a smile flitting across his face as they walked out of Leytonstone station half an hour later. Lily nudged him with her elbow as they walked out of the tunnel, past Le Parisien, a small cafe beside the tube. She'd done it immediately, hadn't thought about it at all, but she'd caught the laugh just before she let it out, afraid that it was too much. Too familiar.

They walked up Church Street in silence.

They were halfway up the High Street when James shifted beside her. He rubbed his hands together, stuffed them deep in his pockets, and Lily saw him glance at her from the corner of her eye. When she turned to look at him, though, his gaze was trained on his shoes.

James grabbed her post off the mat when they walked through the door into her building a few minutes later, and she smiled her thanks as they walked quietly up the stairs. James hovered behind her as she unlocked her door, stood a bit awkwardly in her doorway as he watched Lily hang up her coat. Lily gave him a look and James stepped into her flat, pulled the door shut behind him.

'I'll put the kettle on?' Lily toed her shoes off onto the shoe rack beside the door and James nodded as he shrugged out of his coat.

'Yeah, alright.'

She walked down the corridor into the kitchen, did her best to keep from looking back over her shoulder to confirm that James hadn't decided to turn and run in the three seconds since she'd left him standing by her front door. She set the kettle on the base, grabbed two mugs from the mug tree in the corner, and took a deep breath before she turned and walked back out into the sitting room. James was sitting unnaturally still on the edge of the sofa on the side closest to the door. His gaze was moving steadily around the room, taking in her thinly stocked bookshelf, the stacks of dvds on her mantlepiece that were as chaotically organised as ever, the dinosaur slippers she had left underneath her coffee table, and the packet of biscuits she'd rewrapped and left on her coffee table the night before. He turned when he noticed her standing in the doorway and almost smiled — she _saw it,_ saw it start in the way that his eyes lit up as they found hers, the way the corners of his mouth twitched and his face got lighter, the lines smoothing out on his face. But he caught it before it could really begin — he pressed his lips together in a tight line and dropped his eyes back to his knees.

'Tea'll be done in a minute,' she said, and James looked up, met her gaze again. 'What kind of biscuits do you fancy?'

James cleared his throat. 'What kind have you got?'

'All sorts,' she started ticking them off on her fingers, 'those ginger nuts on the table, plain and chocolate digestives, tea creams, I think I've got a packet of Jaffa cakes…'

'Whatever you want is fine.'

She heard the kettle click off and turned, walked back into the kitchen, and poured their tea. She was planning on finishing the ginger nuts set on the table in the sitting room, but she grabbed a packet of chocolate digestives from the pantry for James and walked slowly back out into the sitting room after she finished preparing their tea.

She crossed the room and settled onto the sofa next to him, careful to sit close but not so close as to seem like she was operating under the assumption that time and distance had fixed everything that had gone wrong between them. She held James' mug out towards him and he accepted it with a small smile.

'Colour alright?' she asked as she pulled the digestives out from under her arm and set them on the table in front of him. James nodded and took a sip of the tea that they both knew was too hot to drink just yet.

'Perfect.' He gave her a slightly warmer smile over the edge of his mug.

They lapsed into silence.

It was hard to believe that it was James sitting beside her now, James that was sitting there quietly dunking his biscuits into his tea and keeping his thoughts to himself. They always had something to say, especially to one another — but now there was too much to say. And while, before, she might not have worried about saying something the right way or getting it perfectly right, before, she'd been scared and terrified and snapping at him half the time when she was trying to tell him how she was feeling without actually having to give anything away. She'd been trying to clue him in without letting herself be vulnerable and, as her therapist had reminded her probably a dozen times a session, you couldn't really have one without the other.

And so, even though she was now sitting there worrying about getting the words just right, feeling like she needed everything to be _perfect_ , she knew that perfect probably wasn't going to look the way that she was telling herself it might. It might look a bit messy, it might get a bit heated, one or both of them might cry a little… perfect wasn't going to be instant and amicable agreement, and, ultimately, that isn't what they needed anyway. They needed open and honest and vulnerable. They needed clarity.

'I've missed you.'

James was in the middle of sucking a bit of melted chocolate off his thumb when she spoke, and his head snapped up. It became that much harder to continue when he was looking at her like that, like things were hinging on her words, but she needed him to know that she hadn't stopped thinking about him once since last year. That through everything that had happened, the internet being out for their blood, the fights, her entire life being upended, that through it all, he'd been there in the back of her mind. That he'd been constant.

That she was so fucking sorry.

She'd said it in that email, but it had taken on a new colour when they'd suddenly been thrust into the national spotlight and dragged through the mud for months. When every angry, terrified word they'd said in the aftermath had ripped open old wounds and left them to bleed.

She needed him to know that even then, even when she was in her blackest moods and was muttering to herself about how much she fucking _hated_ him because he was a stupid, selfish arsehole that had ruined her damn life, that even then, he'd —

'I've missed you,' she said again, 'I've missed you so much.'

'I've missed you, too.'

'I'm so sorry — '

James shook his head, leaned forward and set his mug on the table. 'Don't,' he said, 'you don't have to do that, I — '

Lily set her mug on the table beside his, turned in her seat so that she was facing him. 'What, apologise? Of course I have to apologise.'

'We need to _talk_ about it,' he shifted and faced her, 'actually fucking talk about it. We apologised last time and immediately turned around and fell apart again and I — ' He ran a frustrated hand through his hair. 'I'm not doing that again. I'm not falling apart and coming back again. I'm not.'

She could feel her temper, her old safety net, starting to kick on in her gut — the temptation to just start shouting was so easy, it was right there, and while any other time she would have given into it, would have shouted herself hoarse, she knew that this time needed to be different. They couldn't cover this in blustering and shouting — it worked with just about everything else, but nothing else they ever fought about was real. It was James never wearing proper trousers and Lily refusing to believe that TOWIE was good precisely _because_ it was trash and never agreeing on which fucking music they wanted to listen to in the car, but this — this fight was real and it was important and they couldn't fix it if they were too busy shouting at one another.

'I know,' she settled her hands on the sofa in the space between them, palms up. 'Alright. Where do you want to start?'

* * *

 **see you in a minute (or, okay, like a half an hour give or take) with the next chapter!**


	43. Chapter 42

**my whole house smells like cinnamon now and honestly I'm living for it**

 **(and sorry I know I said this would be up in a half an hour, but there were some things that really needed tweaking)**

* * *

'God, I don't know,' James said. 'I feel like we've talked this fucking thing to death and yet nothing's solved.'

'Well, let's just start at the beginning then and skip as necessary.'

'Yeah, alright.'

Lily pulled in a breath. 'When did you start having feelings for me?'

'Ah, fuck,' James smiled sheepishly at her and Lily's heart nearly gave way. 'The minute I bloody saw you, didn't I?'

'No, real feelings. Like, "snog the pants off me" feelings.'

'Same answer, really.' Lily shot him a look, and he sighed. 'I don't know, I guess I realised it in Greece. We were walking down to that beach, remember, to do that stupid Olympics date, and we were arguing about Indiana Jones and there was just something about the — the fire in your eyes as you shouted over me. You were so beautiful, you're always so beautiful, and I just — I realised then that the things I felt whenever you were around… they were more than just professional or platonic things.

'And then Inverness. The way you were looking at me in my room….' He trailed off and the intensity of his gaze made Lily's heart start hammering against her ribs. He looked at her for a moment longer before he cleared his throat. 'How about you?'

She took a deep breath. 'I realised in Rome.'

She fell quiet for a moment, let her mind float back to that warm, sunny day in Italy. She remembered how excited he'd been, his eyes bright, that infectious smile on his face, remembered how nervous he was the moment they'd started properly filming, the softer, quieter part of himself coming out just a bit.

She remembered how he'd looked at her as she helped him into bed, remembered the way he'd felt underneath her hands, remembered the feeling rocketing through her, the realisation that she wanted to know what every single piece of him felt like against every single part of her.

'I'd had to walk your drunk arse upstairs,' she chuckled, let her eyes fall from his for a moment. 'You asked me if I liked you. I realised then that I really did.' Her voice was quiet, so soft that she wasn't sure how James was hearing her, even from the other end of the sofa.

She saw his hand twitch toward her, a barely detectable movement — he pressed his hand back down into his thigh, looked down at his knees.

'I spent the whole time we were filming fighting this,' she said. She sounded exhausted. 'I wanted it, so badly, but I knew that there was no way that it was going to work out and I tried to put up walls and —'

She took a deep breath and James' eyes found hers again.

'I should've realised that you can't build walls and destroy them at the same time. I was trying to protect both of us from the inevitable fallout and went about it in the worst fucking way possible.'

'You could have just talked to me about this. We should've talked about this ages ago.' He sounded so unbelievably frustrated and she couldn't stop the surge of regret that rolled through her.

'I didn't know _how._ And I didn't want to — I — I didn't want to admit that either thing was happening. I didn't want to admit that this wasn't just a fling that didn't matter, I didn't want to admit that this was going to affect shooting. I didn't want to admit just how much I wanted you, wanted _this,_ because then I didn't think there would be any way out.'

'Why does there always have to be a way out? Did you want a way out of this?'

She leant forward and grabbed her mug off the table, took a slow sip before she set it back down. She took a deep breath as she straightened up. 'What I wanted and what I needed to make for myself were two entirely different things.'

James frowned. 'What is that supposed to mean?'

'I — James, I was waiting for you to pick a _fiancée_. I was watching you date twenty women and waiting for you to pick someone to marry _._ I never imagined, not in a million years, that you would take the route you took. I needed to have an escape because if I didn't and I watched you pick someone else — James, I was not going to be okay.'

'But Lily,' James raked a hand through his hair, 'I told you time and time again that I was ready to quit the show for you. I was ready to leave _everything,_ to say fuck all to the contract and let the lawyers deal with it, to take the hit in the media, to deal with whatever the fuck the fall out was going to be. I was ready to deal with all of it and you never let me. Why didn't you let me?'

'I don't know.' That was clearly the wrong answer because James sighed, now visibly more frustrated.

'I _don't,_ ' she said. 'I thought we were being honest? I don't know why I fucking insisted that you stay in this, I don't know why, even after it became clear that this whole thing was basically prolonged torture for us, I refused to let you take a way out. It was my job, partially, and the terror over losing that and the fact that literally everyone else we knew would _also_ be out of a job and I didn't want that on my conscience, but it was also being afraid of everything that I knew would come after. Of the way people would talk about us.

'Going on with the show seemed like your way out. It seemed like your alternative to me and I — if I was going to be making myself an alternative, I couldn't be the only one. You needed to have an escape, too.'

'But I didn't want it. I didn't want a way out, Lily.'

The look in his eyes was going right through her, settling heavily in her gut. They sat quietly for a moment, just staring at each other. Lily kept her eyes glued to his because if she didn't, if they were allowed to wander, they would start tracing the lines of him she'd told herself she'd forgotten.

'It was never going to be as simple as going up to Peter and telling him you were done,' Lily said, and she hoped, desperately, that her voice didn't sound the way it did in her head. Breathy and a bit pathetic.

Though it was probably better than the biting, sarcastic tone she would have used if they'd been having this conversation a year and a half ago.

'Obviously I know that.' James, too, seemed to have gotten the memo about tone. 'But I would've — Lily, how many times had I told you that I didn't care about that fucking contract?'

She breathed a laugh. 'Maybe a million.'

'Then why, _why_ wouldn't you believe that I meant that? Why wouldn't you let us try and find a way out together?'

Whatever shred of dignity she'd been holding onto completely disintegrated.

'Because,' she was mildly embarrassed at the exhausted, desperate note in her voice, 'what was I going to do when it all blew back up in my face? When I lost my job and had a black mark on my reputation that would make it really fucking difficult to find another one _and then_ when the public found out that their next series of _Eligible_ was going to be cancelled because their bachelor had decided to run off with his producer? How was I going to deal with that? How was I going to deal with what our relationship would become in the midst of that?'

'I would've stood by you —'

'At first,' Lily said, 'at first. But then it would've gotten hard because we'd be taking all this fucking abuse online and then someone would find out where one of us lives and it would spiral out of control. I mean, god, as it was, it was really, really bad for a while. There were days I didn't leave bed unless it was to go throw up because someone said something absolutely _horrific_ to me online. I started having panic attacks. Sometimes I could barely get myself out the door to get to work because I was terrified that someone would recognise me on the street. And I know that if it had been the two of us, you'd want to help, but I'd close up and shut down and push you away, and you'd try to bring me back but I'd have retreated so far into myself that it would have been impossible and then nothing about us would be _us_ anymore. And then you'd leave.

'You wouldn't want to, not at first because you'd convince yourself that there was something you could do, but you'd get tired of it. You'd leave. And I wouldn't blame you because you would be _right_ to leave, you know, because I wasn't talking to you and I'd probably started sniping at you or whatever, but then I'd be alone with no job and no way to pay any of my fucking bills — because, you know, I didn't know that Marlene was going to do what she did — and I'm — James, I've spent enough of my life living like that. How could I possibly step into something that could put me back there again?'

James' brow furrowed. 'Lily, I — I didn't know it was that bad, I —'

She waved him off. 'It's alright now.'

'No, but — I'm sorry. I'm sorry I wasn't there. I — I should've been there.'

She watched the hurt, the regret, the anger that he was directing at himself start unfolding on his features. She shook her head at him. 'James, it — it would've happened whether you were there or not. There was literally never going to be any way that we could stop people from doing that shit.'

' _Still_ —'

She held her hand up and James fell silent. 'I wasn't alone. I had Marlene who hired me even though it was a huge fucking risk and literally never stopped checking on me. I had Benjy. Vanessa, Benjy's wife, came over a lot. Brought me food because she knew I hated to leave the house. Dorcas started stopping by. I _wasn't_ alone. And, honestly, I needed time. I needed to not be worrying about what our relationship was going to be and how all of this was damaging it. I needed space.'

'How can you honestly forgive me for letting you go through that alone, though?'

'I'm not angry with you. Why would I need to forgive you?'

James sighed heavily. 'Still. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.'

She wanted to tell him, again, that he really had nothing to be sorry for, but she knew that it wasn't going to help anything. She just nodded. They sat quietly for a few moments before James sighed again.

'I wish we could've talked about this earlier,' James said. 'We could've avoided so much of this.'

'How? How could things have possibly gone any other way?'

He was quiet for a long minute and Lily could tell that he was desperately searching for an answer, for some way that would have made sense, a way out that would have done the least damage.

He wasn't going to find one — she'd spent weeks thinking it over last year.

Because if they emerged from that whole mess alright, if the public didn't hate them and Lily was able to keep her job or leave with dignity, it meant that Summer or Liza, whoever he'd have chosen if he'd done the thing properly would have gotten hurt.

They'd believed in what they had with him.

And maybe, when she was being really honest with herself, that was always a small source of her reserve where they were concerned — how could he be so affectionate with her, say the things that he said to her, and still look the way he looked on camera?

A lot of it was editing. Some of it was her pushing him to behave.

But she always wondered if there was more to it. She wasn't proud of it, but there it was.

'What are you thinking about?'

She'd been so lost in her own head that she hadn't realised James was watching her. She started frantically casting around for a way to put it that didn't sound absolutely pathetic and he frowned at her.

'Don't make something up, Lily. Just tell me.'

Damn him.

'I —' She hesitated. There was no smooth way for her to start saying the things that she needed to say. Her impulse was still to find something else, anything else, to talk about, but she knew that it would be incredibly stupid and selfish of her at this point.

Not that realising that about her choices had stopped her in the past, but this was supposed the be different. This was different.

'I was just — I don't know, I was thinking about Liza and Summer and them.'

Whatever James had been expecting her to say, it clearly wasn't that. 'What? Why?'

'Just —' she raked a hand over her face and exhaled hard. She was going to sound stupid, so stupid and jealous and pathetic and —

'Lily, come on.'

She looked up and met his eyes again. She left them there for a moment before she returned her gaze to her lap, watched her hands as she twisted her fingers together. It was too hard to look him in the eye and say what she needed to say.

'I just always wondered if maybe your feelings for them were genuine, too. Like maybe they were an escape you had in mind. A "Lily doesn't like me, guess I'll marry Liza," kind of thing.'

James sighed, dragged a hand through his hair. 'Lily. I — _no._ No.'

She looked up at him, tried to read his face for any kind of sign that he was lying to her, but his expression was smooth (if a bit anguished) and she knew that he was telling her the truth.

He was always telling her the truth. She didn't know why she kept wanting to doubt him.

'I hated myself for what we were putting them through on that show,' James said. 'I still hate myself for it sometimes. I hate that I had to go in front of a camera and pretend like I was falling in love with them. I hated how _easy_ it was to do that, how easily they believed it. I tried to put up some kind of boundary, tried to be honest, but every time, someone was coming in, you or Jax or fucking someone, and telling me that we needed to _reshoot_ , _more feeling this time, Potter._

'They're all amazing and I didn't want to hurt anyone. But I knew that going on the path we were on, you and I, that I was going to have to pick someone in the end and so — I mean, maybe that's what you saw? I don't know if I'd say I was giving it a real shot with them, you know, but I was... I guess I was trying to see what it could be. What being with Liza or Summer would be like.'

Lily wanted to dip her head, to look away, wanted to curl in on herself and pretend that she wasn't hearing the things she was hearing. James seemed to have noticed because he shook his head and his hand moved closer to hers on the sofa — they still weren't touching, but they were incredibly close now.

'How could I propose to one of them in good conscience, though, once I knew that I felt the way that I did? Even after all those fucking weeks where we weren't talking and everything was icy and terrible, even when I'd been trying to convince myself that I could be happier with Liza or Summer... I mean, god, I could've been happy with one of them probably, but I couldn't get past you. I didn't _want_ to get past you.'

He was quiet for a long minute, his eyes holding hers like he was trying to reinforce the truth behind what he was about to say.

'It was only ever you, Lily.'

She tried not to get hung up on the fact that it was past tense, that it was all past tense.

She wanted to ask him if that meant he was over this, if he wasn't willing to try to work this out with her. She didn't know how they could possibly even _begin_ to work through a lot of this, but it felt like it was within the realm of possibility, distanced from the show as they were now. No more cameras following them around, no more looming deadlines, no more orders to kiss other women.

If they gave this a go, it would finally be just them.

She wanted that so desperately that it scared her.

'I'm sorry.' It wasn't everything she meant to say, but it was a start.

'For what?' James raised an eyebrow at her, and she couldn't tell if he was genuinely confused or just pushing for her to elaborate. Either way, it came to the same thing.

'For — fuck, James, for putting you through all of that? For not having this conversation with you months ago? For not just being honest right from the beginning and telling you how I felt? I'm sorry for a million things.'

'You're right, though,' James said, and Lily's eyebrows jumped in surprise.

'There was no way that we would have been able to make it work while we were on that damn show. Even if I'd left —' he heaved a sigh, raked his fingers through his hair. 'Even if I'd left, I don't know that we would have been able to work it out. Not then. And I'm sorry, too, because the whole fucking time — I mean, you went back and forth, sure, but it's not like I didn't expect it. And then I got all hurt and cross and angry even though you reacted exactly the way I expected you to. It's not like I ever went into any of that on the show thinking that you were suddenly going to be like "Cool, alright, so let me call Peter and cancel this contract".'

Lily breathed a laugh. 'Yeah, that was never going to happen.'

The corner of James' mouth twitched like he was going to smile. 'I didn't think it would. And I was really pissed off about that for a while, but I — I get it. I get it now. And I don't think I could've lived with myself if you'd lost your job because of me. Knowing what that would do to you and then everyone else on the show —' He shook his head and dropped his gaze to his knees. 'I'm sorry. I know I was pressuring you to quit or to let me quit and I never even thought about all the fallout. I just wanted some way that made it easier for us to be together.'

He looked up at her then and the intensity in his eyes made her heart start thudding hard inside her chest. 'I've only ever wanted this to work with you, Lily.'

'Do you think that — I don't know, maybe we could —' She broke off, unsure of what to say next.

Maybe it was too soon to be asking this. They had more to talk about, more to clear up, more to go over. But she also knew that they could talk for the rest of their goddamn lives — nothing was going to matter until they were in the middle of it again.

Until they had to trust one another again.

James, though, seemed to be thinking along similar lines. 'Give this a go?'

She nodded, before she pulled in a sharp breath and awkwardly racked on, 'Or, you know, be friends or whatever it's — whatever you think, I don't know.'

James was quiet for so long that Lily finally peeked up at him.

He had that look in his eyes again. The one that ignited fire in her veins.

'I don't want to be friends, Lily.'

It had been barely louder than a whisper, but the rough grate of his voice was visceral. He pulled his eyes from hers and she could feel them dragging slowly over her skin, felt where they caught and lingered.

It would be so easy to get his hands on her, for her to have his fingertips teasing her skin until she exploded. She could already feel it, how it would be, and she shifted it her seat.

'I —' he pulled his eyes back up to hers and cleared his throat, started again. 'I should go.'

'Do you have to?' The words were out of her mouth before she could stop them and she winced internally at the desperation in them.

James nodded jerkily. 'Yeah, Evans. Yeah, I — I should.'

The way she felt when he said her name again — it should be illegal. It was too good.

'Do you want to?' She didn't mean for her voice to sound like it did, low and dirty and a bit like a challenge.

His breath fell out of him in a rush. 'No.'

It was what she needed. She swallowed, nodded slowly, and got to her feet before she could talk herself out of it. James looked at her, confused, as he stood.

'You should go,' she said. 'It's getting late... And we both know what'll happen if you stay.'

The weight of that truth settled between them, and Lily could feel it tugging on her, begging her to step closer to him. She knew how it would go, had the reel playing in the back of her mind — how they'd step forward, the heat between them sparking and setting off a chain reaction it would be impossible to stop. She could almost feel the way he'd run his hands over her, how they'd move slowly, patiently over her skin while she burnt up around him and tried to spur him forward, how she'd nudge him to the edge until he was falling with her and they became a mess of heat and hands.

She knew what he'd press her up against. What his groan would sound like when she unzipped his trousers.

She could tell that he'd been thinking about it, too, because the look in his eyes as he dragged them over her — her legs, her hips, her neck, before finally settling on her lips — the look in his eyes was enough to stop her heart.

James cleared his throat, and when he spoke, his voice was rough with all the things they could do. 'Yeah.'

They hesitated for a moment longer and Lily could feel her resolve slipping.

'Alright,' she breathed a shaky laugh. 'Go before we lose our remaining self control.'

James nodded, turned on his heel, and started walking to the door.

She pressed her back up against the wall across from the door as she watched James slide his arms back into his coat and slip on his trainers. He patted his pockets, checking to make sure that he had his things, and Lily couldn't help the small smile that hitched at the corner of her lips as she watched him.

He looked up and his eyes found hers. 'What?'

She shook her head, the smile taking over now. 'Nothing.'

James raised an eyebrow at her, but Lily just shook her head. 'Really, it's nothing. You're just — I don't know, it's cute when you pat your pockets like that.' Her cheeks flushed.

The smile spread over his face before he could stop it and god if it wasn't one of the most beautiful smiles she'd ever seen.

'I'll —' James dropped his gaze for an instant before his eyes found hers again. 'I'll call you? Maybe we can go get dinner or — I don't know. Something.'

Lily was nodding before he even finished speaking.

'I'd love that,' she said, hoping that her tone was telling him just how much that was true. 'I would really, really love that.'

James cleared his throat and nodded slowly. He moved his gaze from hers and traced them over her features again, painting soft, easy trails across her skin. Lily didn't notice that he'd moved closer to her at first, but then she was having to crane her head back to be able to look him in the eye.

She looked down and their chests were almost touching.

When she looked up again, James was looking at her with an expression so tangled that it was difficult to tell which emotion was winning out. She tried to soften her gaze as she looked at him, to let him know that she'd meant everything they'd said. To let him know that she was going to try.

Her chest ached with how much she needed him to believe that.

James leaned down slowly, watching her until he couldn't anymore, placed a featherlight kiss against her cheek. And even though the heat of his breath against her skin was enough to wind her tighter, Lily left her hands by her sides, careful not to cross the boundaries they'd set.

He straightened up and smiled at her again, and this one was warmer, happier than before and Lily's gut twisted.

'I'll see ya.' James stepped back and put his hand on the door.

Lily nodded. 'See ya.'

He opened her door and stood just beyond the threshold, looking at her like he was trying to figure something out. After a moment, he turned to leave, and —

'Text me when you get home. Please.'

James' head snapped back up and he looked at her, a slow, easy smile spreading across his face.

He nodded, the smile fading in the centre as he spoke. 'Yeah, alright.'

Lily watched him walk down the stairs and hovered in the doorframe until she heard him walk out the front door.

* * *

 **See you next week! I'm already sad about it, tbh, because next week will be the LAST WEEK. I'm not leaving this story altogether but I WON'T BE HANGING OUT WITH IT LIKE THIS ANYMORE AND I JUST.**

 **I'm sure I'll ramble more about this next week. Anyway - have a lovely week xx**


	44. Chapter 43

**Happy Sunday xx**

* * *

She and James saw each other more and more often over the next few weeks. They got together a reasonable amount at first, once, maybe twice a week — they went out to dinner, caught a film, went to the park — but, as time passed, they found themselves spending most evenings together.

She liked this change in tempo, enjoyed the slow, easy sort of thing that was as different from their show relationship as it could possibly be. They'd burned on the show, slowly when they were apart, explosively when they were together. It had been, a lot of the time, like she had acid dissolving bits and pieces of her as they went.

Their show relationship was corrosive. Something that had sucked the bloody sanity right out of her and left her wrecked. Left both of them wrecked.

This, though — this was something else entirely.

The slow, aching burn for him was still there, the one that made her want to put her hands on him and drag them over every square inch of him, but it was cloaked in something softer, something deeper than it had been before.

And the terror was gone.

It was amazing what a difference that made, not being terrified that you're going to be overheard or have something you say or do captured on a camera you hadn't seen (fears that, clearly, were completely justified). She gave herself the space to look at him, to really look at him, and to do things as they came to her instead of filtering them through a paranoid system intent on controlling them so they weren't found out.

She took his hand when they stepped out onto the pavement as they left a restaurant. She rested her head on his shoulder when they sat in the grass in the park.

She still caught herself sometimes in those early days, jerking up and jolting away because she heard something that sounded too like a camera shutter. He brought her back every time — a warm smile, a soft hand on the elbow, an arm around her waist, a kiss to the side of the head or the back of her hand.

That, though, is about where the kissing stopped for the first few weeks.

Nothing more intense than a cheek kiss.

She knew that they'd needed to shut down the physical part of their relationship for a while, that they needed to actually talk and build a stable foundation, especially after the veritable mudslide that had been _Eligible_. But now they were two months into this thing and what had been easily ignorable at the start was now becoming something of an obsession.

She wanted him desperately.

And she thought about it damn near constantly.

Marlene had bought her some fancy new vibrator for her birthday and laughed like she was the funniest person on earth. _Because I'm sick of listening to you talk about how you want to jump James but "aren't sure you're ready for that yet",_ the card had said. _Also Dorcas swears by this model, and believe me, you want to trust her judgement._

Lily had been annoyed, but she couldn't deny that the gift was a particularly good one.

The old one just wasn't doing it these days.

As they rolled into February, though, Lily started to sense that, maybe, she wasn't the only one desperate to up the ante a little bit.

They were lingering longer and longer in the doorway when they were leaving one another in the evening, and sometimes she caught his eye across the table at dinner and she could feel the tension crackling between them.

But, still, each evening ended with a warm hug goodbye. A soft kiss on the cheek. A lingering hand on the waist or the elbow that almost, _almost,_ ended in a proper kiss.

Tonight, she was standing at her podium on set, her hands mindlessly gathering the papers that had spread themselves across the wooden surface while she'd watched Marlene interview the last guest of the evening. She saw her mobile light up out of the corner of her eye, and Lily's hands stilled as she dropped her gaze to the screen.

A message from James.

She shifted the stack of papers she was holding into one hand, pressed her thumb to the unlock button, and clicked into her messaging app —

 _James Potter: I'm sure you're still shooting, but want to get dinner tonight? X_

She felt the silly smile spread across her face and didn't even remotely care who saw it. Everyone on set had already taken the piss out of her about it, her completely sappy looks whenever she was talking to James, so it wasn't like she had any dignity left anyway.

 _Lily Evans: nearly done actually. Id love dinner — what are you in the mood for_

She watched the screen and felt her stomach clench in anticipation when the reply bubble popped up. He typed for a moment before the bubble disappeared and, because she probably shouldn't just stand there and stare at her screen while they had a show going on, Lily locked her phone with a sigh.

When they wrapped twenty minutes later and she finally thought to check her phone again, there was a message from James waiting.

 _French?_

Lily smiled to herself as she replied. This time, James' response was instant.

 _Lily Evans: sounds great just tell me where to meet you and I'll be there_

 _James Potter: Please, Evans. I'm picking you up. Thirty? How much more time do you need?_

 _Lily Evans: thirty should do it xx_

 _James Potter: See you then xx_

Lily spent the next half an hour anxiously checking the clock — she didn't finish any of the things she'd been intending to finish, and while that should probably have bothered her, there was always tomorrow.

She popped into Marlene's office to say goodbye a few minutes before she was set to leave and was waiting semi-patiently in the front lobby when James arrived.

She hadn't noticed him come in — she was too busy talking to Jamie, the receptionist — but when she felt a hand settle lightly on her hip, she knew who it was. She turned her head and smiled back at him.

'Hey.'

James grinned, leaned forward, and dropped a kiss to her temple. 'Hey.'

Lily turned back to Jamie, smiled at him (and inwardly laughed at the astounded look on his face). 'I'll see you tomorrow, Jamie. Have a great night.'

Jamie nodded, cleared his throat. 'You too, Lily.'

James' hand slid across her lower back as they turned away from Jamie's desk, and he took her hand as they started back across the white tiled floor towards the door. Now that night had fallen, it was colder outside than she'd expected it would be, and she tucked her jacket tighter around her and stepped closer to James' side.

James squeezed her hand lightly and, when she looked up, he was smiling down at her.

'How was your day?'

Lily sighed happily. 'It was great. Marlene did this brilliant interview with a group of American activists today and I think people are really going to love it.'

James grinned. 'That's amazing. Are these those kids you were telling me about few weeks ago?'

Lily nodded. 'Marlene and I were talking after the interview finished — those kids are half our damn age, but they're going to change everything in America if they keep it up.'

'You can only hope they do, at least.'

'Seriously. But how was your day?'

James half shrugged. 'It was alright. I made a lot of progress this morning, got a half dozen more salary commitments, which was great, but then I spent the afternoon in budget meetings, which was less than great.'

She laughed. 'God, I know. Aren't budget meetings the worst?'

'They really are! I know that they're necessary and all that, but oh my god. Listening to two accountants fight over their quarterly projections is not my idea of a productive meeting. I'd much rather they met internally and then we had a meeting once everything had been finalised.'

'You know you could make that change, right? You're the boss, aren't you?'

James hummed thoughtfully. 'Oh, yeah, I guess I could. I forgot that I'm in charge.'

Lily laughed, reached up with her free hand to hold James' bicep. James squeezed her hand again and leaned over to press another kiss to the side of her head.

They chatted easily about work for a few more minutes, the streets and the crowds and the sounds of the city fading to the edges of her attention as they talked, but when they turned the corner and started down the small side street, Lily felt her heart climb into her throat.

She knew where they were. She knew what restaurant he'd chosen.

She'd forgotten she was holding his hand, so when she stopped on the pavement, she looked up in confusion when James halted beside her. He turned to face her, frown already starting to line his expression.

'You alright? What's wrong?' He was moving his eyes rapidly over her as though checking for signs of damage.

She shrugged and shook her head. James' frown deepened.

He stepped forward, his hand still clutching hers, and reached his free hand up, watching her carefully as he moved. He trailed his fingers along her jaw, brushing his thumb along her cheek and weaving his fingers into her hair, and Lily leaned into his hand, let her eyes fall closed for a moment.

It always surprised her how it felt to have his hands on her skin, how her skin sparked to life under his touch and started to hum with electricity. This was the closest they'd been, the most intimately he'd touched her, since they'd started seeing one another again, and she had half a mind to just lean into this moment and forget about everything else.

Maybe they didn't even need to get dinner. Maybe they could just go back to his and call it an evening.

'What's wrong? Are you feeling alright? Do you want to go home?'

She opened her eyes and met his gaze — his eyes were serious and his brow was creased with concern. She shook her head, her chin bumping softly against his wrist.

'I just realised where we're going and — I don't know, it just kind of — It just caught me off guard.'

The grooves in James' forehead ground deeper into his skin. 'I've fucked up haven't I?'

Lily shook her head slowly and James' hand fell from her cheek. 'No — no, I just — I'm surprised, is all.'

'Good surprised, or?'

'Yeah,' she realised as she was saying it that it was true and she smiled softly at him. 'Good surprised. Definitely good surprised.'

'Okay,' James' hand flexed in hers and she knew he would have run his hand through his hair if he hadn't been holding her hand, 'because you don't _look_ good surprised. You look a little like you want to take off down the street.'

She chuckled. 'I just — I'm nervous. That's all.'

James' expression softened then, the lines in his forehead smoothing out as he considered her. He stepped forward, took her face in his hand again. 'Why are you nervous?'

Lily leaned her cheek into his hand and half shrugged. 'This is just — this is where everything started, and I'm still anxious about going back here because I'm a little convinced that it will dredge up old feelings that we somehow missed dealing with.'

'You think?'

She couldn't tell from his face what he was thinking — he was keeping his expression perfectly even.

'I don't know? I — I haven't thought about the show, not really, since we started talking again. After that first night when we talked it to _death_ and then all our conversations since, I haven't felt like I need to think about it over and over again like I'd used to. So maybe in that respect, I'm past it, but then what if we go in here tonight and I freak out?'

'Do you feel like you're going to freak out?'

'I feel like I don't know.'

James nodded slowly, stepped closer so that the edges of his jacket were brushing against her chest.

'We don't have to go in,' he said. 'I was just —' He took a deep breath and let it fall out of him in a rush. 'I was thinking that we could start over. We can't go back, you know, properly, but I thought that we could go back to the very start and rewrite the beginning. We've just batted that back and forth and — I mean, I don't know. But if you're unsure or uncomfortable or you just don't want to, we don't have to.'

LIly frowned. 'But — you made a reservation.'

James shrugged. 'Who cares? If you don't want to go in there, we won't.'

Lily was quiet for a moment as she thought back to the last time that they'd been in this restaurant. When she'd had to look at a note in her phone to remember what his name was, when the only picture she had of him in her head was his football club's headshot. If she tried, she could almost think herself back to that place, but it was so hard, now, to imagine that there was a time in her life when she didn't know him. That there was a Lily that didn't know that James wore glasses that were always a tiny bit crooked, that his smile hitched up noticeably higher on the left side, that the way James' hand felt in hers was one of the most amazing things in the entire world.

It was impossible to believe that that version of herself existed.

He'd written himself all over her so many times — had completely consumed her life during filming, had occupied the back of her mind in the year and a half between filming and the interview he'd done with Marlene last year. Even when he was gone, even when she wasn't really thinking about him, he was still always _there_ in her mind — she knew what he would say about situations she found herself in, she knew how he would react. She could feel the weight of him pressing on her mind, heavy, even when she wasn't letting herself acknowledge it.

Their relationship then had been filled with so much anxiety — the dread of getting caught, the confusion about where they really stood that she could never satisfactorily sort out. She was worried that going back, that putting themselves back in the restaurant where it had all started would bring all of that uncertainty back.

Since December, though, they'd been on surprisingly stable ground. They'd talked it to death, all the ways they'd fucked up, and she was finally at peace with everything that had happened. They hadn't fixed anything, but they couldn't fix it, not without going back in time and that was a useless thing to hope for. Instead, they were acknowledging everything they'd done and setting it aside. They were talking about things, even when it was awkward, they were building trust and understanding and common ground.

They were moving on.

And, most of the time, it was like _Eligible_ hadn't even happened.

She took a breath before she looked back up at him. 'Let's go.'

'Alright — what do you want eat?'

'What? No, I meant — let's go in. It's — I'm fine.'

He studied her for a moment. 'Are you sure?'

She nodded, smiling as an idea struck her. 'Yeah. A fresh start'll be nice anyway, I think.'

She stepped back and moved around him towards the door, held her hand up when James moved to follow her.

'What?'

'Hang out here for a minute.'

James quirked an eyebrow. 'Why?'

'If we're going to redo this, we're going to do it right.'

James raised an eyebrow at her as she walked away. Lily grinned at him before she turned on her heel and strode into the restaurant.


	45. Chapter 44

**you guysssss how is this the end?**

* * *

The hostess sat her at a table in the far corner of the restaurant, and Lily ordered a bottle of wine from the waiter when he arrived a moment later.

She pulled her mobile out of the inside pocket of her bag and started flicking through her emails, because if she was going to do this, she was really going to commit. She'd only been sitting there a few minutes — the excitement made it feel longer — when the waiter showed back up beside her table with —

 _God,_ he was gorgeous.

His hair looked wilder than it had when she'd left him on the street — she was sure that he'd been wandering around outside with his hands in it — and, now that he'd unbuttoned his coat, she saw that he was wearing that warm, rust coloured jumper she loved. He had a shade of stubble along his jaw and his glasses were a little crooked and he was beaming, absolutely fucking beaming at her, and it hit her then, how much she loved him.

She knew it, had known it for a while, but just then… god, it was overwhelming.

She got slowly to her feet, her eyes on his, and extended her hand.

'Mr Potter. It's lovely to meet you. I'm Lily Evans.'

James' smile widened as he reached out and took her hand. 'It's wonderful to meet you, Lily. And please,' he brushed his thumb along the inside of her palm and electricity shot up her arm, 'just James.'

The waiter poured James a glass of wine as they settled into their seats, and James smiled at her when the waiter walked away.

'Aren't you going to ask me if my glasses are an aesthetic thing?'

She reached across the table and smacked the back of his hand, which, of course, only set him laughing.

'Shut up,' she said. 'I was nervous.'

'Why were you nervous?'

'Have you seen you?'

James picked up his glass and smiled very cheekily at her over the rim. 'I have seen me. You're a very lucky lady, Evans.'

Lily laughed and rolled her eyes. 'Oh for fucks sake.'

James winked at her and it was really unfair because it meant that she couldn't glare at him and he knew it.

They spent dinner talking about most everything they could think of — the foundation, the show, some new drama in Euphemia's office that she'd called to tell him about earlier. It was always so easy, talking to James, and it never stopped surprising her.

'The last time we were here, ' Lily said, scooping up a bite of her lemon pudding onto her spoon, 'you said you believed in soulmates. Is that still true?'

He hummed through the bite of custard he was eating and set his spoon down onto the plate between them while he considered her.

After a moment, he swallowed and shook his head. 'No.'

Her face almost immediately started to fall, but he took her hand and brushed his thumb along the back of her knuckles, and when she met his eyes, she was overwhelmed by the feeling in them.

'I think that soulmates makes it sound easy,' he said, 'like it's not work. I think you find that person who makes you happier than anyone else in the entire world and then you work at it every day. And some days it's easier than others,' they both laughed and he squeezed her hand, 'but it's always worth it. Even when it's hard. That's better than soulmates to me. Because it's not just destined — you're choosing, every day, to wake up and be there with that person and to work through issues and to fight about laundry and what zone to live in —'

Lily laughed again, and James smiled softly at her, gathered her hand in both of his own. 'Every day you wake up and you choose one another again — that means more than soulmates could ever mean.'

When they finished eating, they paid the bill and walked back out into the cold night air. The temperature had dropped at least another few degrees since they'd gone inside and the wind had picked up, so Lily stepped closer to James' side as they walked back up the street towards Waterloo station.

They didn't talk much as they rode the underground back to James' place — they just stood in front of one another in the centre of the carriage, soft, easy smiles on their faces, held hands as they walked through the station at their transfer. They didn't talk much, but Lily could feel the shift in the energy between them. The tension was starting to coil itself tighter in her stomach and, when James caught her eye, she could tell that he was feeling the same anticipation.

He ran his hand down her arm before taking her hand when they got off in Knightsbridge and Lily could feel the sparks on her skin underneath her layers.

His brushed his thumb along the back of her hand as they walked, the soft buzz of the city around them filling the silence they didn't feel the need to fill themselves. She was too distracted by the anticipation building in her gut, anyway — she wouldn't have been able to maintain a steady conversation just then if her life depended on it.

All she could think about was getting her hands on him the moment they walked through his door.

Maybe it was because tonight was about starting over that she thought, as they turned down James' street along Montpelier Square, about the other times she'd been to James' house, first before _Eligible_ and again after their conversation at her place in November. Both times had felt like they were at a starting line, like they were on the verge of something new — tonight was almost the same. There was the excitement, the anticipation, the possibility, but overwhelmingly, the feeling was softened, blurred by her affection for him.

It wasn't a jolt to her system, but a slow, warm realisation. A happy, grateful acceptance.

James dropped her hand as they climbed the stairs, and Lily waited patiently behind him while he dug the keys out of his jacket pocket and unlocked the door.

Hearing the bolt unlock and the soft creak of the door as they stepped inside drew the threads tighter in her gut.

They hung their coats on the rack James had behind the door, kicked their shoes off underneath the entry table, neither of them speaking. She kept catching James watching her — when she slid her coat off her arms, when she brushed her hair back off her neck — and she smirked at him as she stepped forward onto the staircase.

'Are you checking me out, Mr Potter?'

He slid his hand along her lower back and it sent shivers down her spine. 'And if I am, Ms Evans?'

'You'd better be prepared to follow through.' She turned and shot him a look over her shoulder before she started slowly up the stairs, but the slow, sexy effect she was going for was totally ruined when James swatted at her bum and she dissolved into laughter.

She whipped around halfway up the stairs and gave him her best glare. 'I was trying to be enticing!'

James put his hands on her hips and leaned down, pressed a kiss to the hinge of her jaw, another to the spot just underneath her ear. 'You're always enticing, love.'

xxx

She turned her head and finally, _finally_ captured his lips with hers and _god_ —

She hadn't remembered just how good this was, how he set every bit of her on fire, how she felt his kiss all the way down to her toes and she thought of nothing else but getting as much of him under her hands as she could manage.

She hadn't remembered how all consuming this was.

But it was different, too, even as she leaned into the familiar feel of his arms around her waist and his chest pressed against hers. This kiss was hot and urgent and a little desperate, but it wasn't terrified. It wasn't anguished. She wasn't telling herself over and over again to ignore the reality, to forget about what she knew would come.

Here with him now?

Lily was only concerned about losing her footing and falling down the stairs.

She took his face in her hands and drew back, pressed her forehead to his.

'James…'

He smiled at her and it lit up every part of her. 'I know.'

She looked at him for a moment longer, this man who was smiling at her like she was the centre of his damn universe, before she turned and jogged up the rest of the stairs.

James caught her round the waist when they reached the top and he pressed her back into the wall opposite. She expected him to kiss her again, but he pressed a soft kiss to the corner of her mouth, brushed his lips slowly along her jaw.

Lily pushed her head back into the wall.

'I've thought about this,' his voice was low and rough and she was going to fuck him right here in this hallway if he kept talking to her like that, 'I've thought about this for weeks.' He traced the tip of his tongue along the underside of her jaw and Lily fisted her hand into the back of his shirt.

'I'm glad we waited,' he kissed the spot underneath her ear that drove her mad, 'but _god,_ Lily. I went to bed every night thinking about this.'

He ran his hand up her side, tugging the hem of her shirt with it, and Lily slid her hands between them, ran them down his chest.

'Are we going to do this?' She took hold of the waistband of his jeans and tugged him closer. 'Please say we're going to do this.'

James laughed and he picked his head up, pressed his forehead to hers.

'Oh, Evans, we are absolutely going to do this.'

Lily slid out from underneath him, turned so she could watch his reaction as she stripped her shirt over her head and dropped it onto the floor.

His eyes went dark and he was about to reach for her when Lily held her hand up and he stilled.

She reached back, unhooked her bra, and tossed it on top of her shirt. And then she immediately started laughing when James stepped forward, scooped her up in his arms, and kissed her.

They knocked around a bit on the way to James' room at the end of the hall. Lily unbuttoned her trousers and clumsily kicked them off, James stripped his jumper off and threw it, knocking his glasses clean off his face in the process.

'Don't you need those?' Lily asked as James trailed hot kisses along the column of her throat.

James shook his head and nipped her neck. 'I'm short sighted.'

Lily hummed and pulled his mouth back to hers.

When they reached his bed, Lily slid back across the duvet while James took his jeans off.

His eyes held hers as the denim slipped down over his hips and fell to the floor. Her eyes flicked down — those trunks left _nothing_ to the imagination — and when her eyes found his again, he had the slightest smirk on his lips.

He ran his tongue along his bottom lip and Lily made a slightly strangled sort of sound.

'Something wrong, Evans?'

'Stop teasing me.' She'd meant it to be forceful, but it came out breathy and desperate.

James hooked his thumb into the waistband of his trunks and pulled the fabric down an inch or two so she could see that "v" in his hips that he knew — it wasn't fair —

'What if I like teasing you?'

'Then you're very mean and I don't like you anymore.' Lily tried to sound cross, but the effect was hampered by the fact that she was practically salivating just looking at him.

James stripped off his trunks and crossed over to the bed. He started at the bottom, dropped kisses along her body as he went — her ankle, her knee, the inside of her thigh, her hip, her breast, the hollow of her throat — and when his mouth finally found hers, Lily was out of her mind for him.

James trailed his fingers up her inner thigh and they moaned when he brushed his fingers against her.

'Lily — _fuck_.' He swirled his fingers over her clit and Lily moaned, arched into him.

'Condom? This is — just — condom. Now. Please.'

James nodded quickly, pressed another quick kiss to her lips before he leaned over and grabbed one out of his bedside cabinet. He tore open the foil, rolled the condom on, and there was something about the pause that made him lean back a bit and take a deep breath.

'Are you sure?' He was panting and the sound of it made her want to kiss him again. 'Are you sure you're ready for this? I just want to check because — I — Lily —'

'James.' Lily reached up and threaded her fingers through his hair and she watched the uncertainty fade from his face. 'I am absolutely positive about this. About you.'

She wrapped her legs around James' waist, pulled him against her, kissed him again, and this time, neither of them stopped.

When he pressed into her, James made an absolutely desperate sound.

He leaned forward and buried his face in her neck for a moment to get his bearings before he started moving, deep, slow, rolling thrusts that went immediately to her head.

'Oh, god,' she grabbed his shoulders as his hips met hers again, 'oh, god, James, you're going to kill me.'

He sat up straighter and the shift in the angle was so _fucking_ good and she couldn't — Her hands fell from his shoulders and she fisted them into the sheets.

James grabbed her knee and lifted her leg, tucked it up under his arm, and Lily swore.

James just laughed breathlessly and rolled his hips against hers again.

The slow, steady movement of his hips against hers was tying her up in knots. The tension was so tight in her stomach that she could barely breathe and she begged him to go faster, harder, _something,_ because it was so maddening and she was so fucking close —

James upped the tempo, his hips moving harder and faster against hers and that alone almost pushed her over the edge.

And then he moved his hand between them and swirled his fingers against her clit and she was done.

James wasn't long behind her — he swore and stilled and buried his face in her neck — and they both lay there breathing heavily. After a minute, James pushed himself up and started to shift off of her.

Lily groaned, grabbed his shoulders, and pulled him back. 'Don't go.'

James kissed her and let her hold him there for a moment before he pulled away again.

'I've got to get rid of this. I'll be right back.'

Lily sighed and climbed out of bed after him. 'I've got to go anyway, but it's the principle of the thing.'

James laughed as he shut the bathroom door. 'And what principle is that?'

'Wanting to make me happy?'

James bent down and kissed her when he opened up the bathroom door a minute later. 'I suppose I do want to make you happy.'

xxx

When Lily joined him back in bed a minute later, James patted the spot next to him. Lily grinned, slid under the duvet, and pressed her nose into his chest before she leaned back onto the pillow and let her eyes fall closed.

James ran his hand back and forth over the curve of her hip, into the dip of her waist. She was just losing herself in the soft, easy feeling of it when he said, 'Evans?'

She hummed but didn't open her eyes.

'Are you awake?'

'No.'

He nudged her arm with his hand. 'Wake up. I want to tell you something.'

She yawned, slid forward on the bed so that she could bury her face in his neck.

'Can't you tell me like this?' He shivered a bit at her breath on his neck, but he shook his head.

'I promise I'll listen,' she said.

He leaned back so she wasn't pressed up against him anymore. 'I want to see your face when I tell you this. I've been waiting a while to tell you and —'

She opened her eyes.

James smiled softly as he reached out and cupped her face, his thumb brushing along the apple of her cheek. 'There she is.'

Lily breathed a laugh. 'What did you want to tell me?'

He just looked at her for a moment, his eyes tracing slowly over her features, before he pulled in a quiet breath. 'I love you.'

She'd known it. She'd seen it written all over his face because he never could hide his emotions, especially not now that she was so good at reading them.

She'd known it, but nothing had prepared her for the way that it would feel when he said it like this. When he looked in her eyes and had his hands on her skin and he told her he loved her like she was everything to him.

It was flying and falling and everything in between. It was every amazing feeling all at once and there was no way in the world to describe it.

She reached forward and wound her fingers through the soft hair at the base of his neck and James' fingers pressed into the base of her spine and he pulled her to him.

'God, James,' she leaned forward and pressed a quick, firm kiss to his lips, 'god, I love you.'

'Do you?'

She nodded. 'I want every Sunday morning with you. I want to tease you while we make tea and dance around the kitchen to the radio and I want to swap sections of the newspaper —'

James breathed a laugh, but she could see it, his excitement, his hope, all over his face. 'Are we a hundred on this Sunday morning?'

'One day, yeah.'

He slid his hand up her back and buried his fingers in her hair, and when he kissed her, Lily could feel everything locking into place.

He pulled back after a moment, a breathtaking smile on his face, and pressed his forehead to hers.

'What else? What else do you want?'

'Everything,' she slipped her leg into between his and slid closer until every inch of them was pressed together. 'I want everything with you.'

* * *

 **I could ramble forever and ever at the end of this, but -**

 **I want to thank you guys for sticking with me through this story. For leaving me so many amazing comments and reactions, for getting me thinking about my own writing in ways that I hadn't before. Having to think about my characters, having to build out James' POV for you guys has been really rewarding writing practice and has helped me really understand this story in ways that I don't think I would've done otherwise.**

 **I am just so lucky to have so many people reading my stories and even luckier that so many of those people take time to leave me feedback (even when it's just a keyboard smash or something). Thank you all so much**

 **Oh, and I'll see you soon (like, not today, but _soon_ ) with a cracky one shot. Happy Sundayyyy xx**


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